


Here for You

by shadowmaat, SLWalker



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Prequel Trilogy
Genre: Angst, C-PTSD, Canon-Typical Violence, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Mentions of past child abuse, Premonitions, Whump
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-06-26
Updated: 2019-08-31
Packaged: 2020-05-19 20:34:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 10
Words: 23,547
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19363711
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shadowmaat/pseuds/shadowmaat, https://archiveofourown.org/users/SLWalker/pseuds/SLWalker
Summary: Based on a prompt from whumpster-dumpster on tumblr: The villain passing out in the middle of a heist/mission/fight, much to the surprise of the hero. They didn’t hit the villain that hard, did they?Obi-Wan is prepared for another epic fight with Maul, but things don't go quite the way he expected. Maul, too, is in for a few surprises.





	1. Chapter 1

The mission was supposed to be an easy one; investigate rumors of a “monster” scaring people in the lower levels of Coruscant. He hadn’t expected to find anything, let alone to know the “monster’s” name.

Obi-Wan lifted a hand and concentrated, flinging Maul back into the wall. The Sith collapsed, and as Obi-Wan shifted to defend against the next onslaught he realized Maul wasn’t moving.

It was a trap. It had to be. Nothing could keep the Jedi Killer down for long. He shifted closer, tense and waiting, watching the rapid breathing of his enemy and alert for the first sign he was about to spring.

“Come now,” he taunted. “You aren’t going to give up that easily, are you? I’ve barely broken a sweat!”

Nothing.

Better to spring the trap, perhaps. Saber at the ready, he walked towards his fallen enemy. That’s when he noticed the pooling blood. A quick check showed that no, there were no protrusions on the wall that could have impaled him, and Obi-Wan himself hadn’t managed to land a blow. So where did the blood come from?

“If you think I’m foolish enough to put myself in striking range…” he warned, but he was already moving closer. Maul’s eyes were closed, his deactivated saberstaff clutched tight in one hand. His breathing had an odd, whistly aspect, now that Obi-Wan was listening to it.

“Maul?”

Deactivating his saber he crouched, prodding the fallen zabrak. When even that failed to garner a reaction it occurred to him the situation might be serious. He checked Maul’s pulse, not reassured by the threadiness of it. Tugging him away from the wall he got the zabrak onto his back and started checking him over. 

The front of his tunic was shredded and soaked in blood. Maul had been in a fight with another saber user before he’d come after Obi-Wan and whoever it was knew just what setting to use to cause maximum damage and minimum cauterization. Puffiness around the eyes hinted at unseen bruises as well. He swore under his breath. 

Dragging him back to the Temple was the most obvious choice, but something in him balked at the idea. It wasn’t that he didn’t trust the Jedi Council, because of course he did, and yet…

In the end he wound up binding Maul’s wounds and dragging him into the aircar he’d borrowed from the Temple hangar. A quick comm to Dex gave him the location of a nearby clinic that did good work without asking too many questions. He let the Temple know he’d be delayed and then sat to wait for Maul to come out of surgery. Why he cared, he couldn’t say. Killing Master Qui-Gon should have earned his lifelong enmity, but there was something about those wounds that bothered him. 

Scans at the clinic showed that not only was the current damage extensive, but there was evidence of previous scars, fractures, breaks, and, according to the doctor who deigned to talk to him, signs of long-term malnourishment. None of it added up to the menacing figure who still haunted his nightmares. It didn’t match Temple stories of what the Sith were supposed to be like, either. An Apprentice, his Master had said. But what kind of Apprentice would stay with a Master who did  _this_  to him? Obi-Wan was determined to find out.

He sat by Maul’s bed in Recovery, trying not to question why he cared. Instead he studied his… well, whatever Maul was to him now, taking in the cracked horns, the waxy skin, and the parched lips. He cautiously reached out and took Maul’s limp hand into his own.

“I know you can’t hear me and will be furious when you wake,” he said. “But I’m still here for you.”

It was probably his imagination that he could feel a slight squeeze in response.


	2. Chapter 2

It had to be Kenobi.

Of all the Jedi in the galaxy, it _had_ to be Kenobi.

If not for the delicate, desperate balancing act in the Force that Maul was trying to perform – keep from bleeding to death, keep moving, get away from his Master and every other predator that would take advantage of his weakened condition – he might have laughed, though it would have been on the whole more hysteria than mirth. The sort of laugh only someone so far past the edge of normal endurance could give; that of _course_ this was what would happen, since everything else had gone wrong.

Somewhere deep under that was something more straightforward and plaintive at once: He was so tired. He just wanted to find somewhere to lay down. Maybe tear apart his robes and fashion enough of a bandage to at least slow down the blood loss, though even that might not have been enough to save him. A chance, anyway. He had wrapped his fear around himself like a cloak, drawing on its strength, but fear was too quicksilver to last forever and he needed to find somewhere to hide.

His mistake – beyond letting himself get caught by his Master’s assassin droids, then his Master himself – was brandishing his saber at some thugs who thought he’d be an easy mark, given his comparative size and the way he couldn’t help but stagger. It was the only weapon he had on him, but apparently, it quickly drew all the wrong attention.

Maul was both literally and metaphorically back to a wall when Kenobi showed up, having followed whatever fear-filled underworld chatter there was about him, looking first startled and then determined. Maul didn’t stand a chance, and he knew it. Not since Theed, months ago; after the med-droid on the _Scimitar_ managed to resection his guts and close the eviscerating swipe that would have halved him, had he not jumped backwards at the right moment, he had known then it was only a matter of time. His Master wanted him dead, though preferably slowly and painfully, and by the time he realized that, he’d lost everything but his clothes and his staff, fleeing into the darkest, foulest parts of the capital world because he didn’t want to make killing him easy.

He was back to the wall when Kenobi showed up, and stood no chance of winning, let alone escaping, but he would at least go down fighting and die with a blade in his hand.

It was with that resigned, exhausted fatalism that Maul lit his saber. He gave no thought to courage, but there was that in his actions, too.

 

 

 

His Master couldn’t send an army, or act too egregiously, not this early on. Not with his plans hinging so much on his public, outward face. But he could send droids and bounty hunters and slavers, the latter two through careful relays and proxies, and so he had. Until his failure of a former apprentice was located and he could finish this.

Any drawing of attention was too much. But attention often found Maul regardless.

It never occurred to Maul to turn himself in, to seek the protection of the government or the Jedi in order to bargain for his own welfare, using his knowledge of the Sith as a bargaining chip. Honor had not given him much of anything in life, but he still didn’t even conceive of the thought of betraying his former Master based on it. The human who raised and trained him. He wasn’t even _angry_ , not really, because it had been his own failures that led to this.

That didn’t mean he wanted to die. Deeper than loyalty or training was survival. He ran. He survived in the underworld. He stole from those who had credits to steal, killed who needed to be killed in order to do so; he picked through refuse to eat, and as often as not, he went without. Once, he stole a half-wrecked speeder and managed to get three city sectors from his last known position. He found out that there were people in the shadows who wanted him for his skin, offering credits or attempting to outright _take_ ; he also found out that there were rare sparks of unexpected kindness. A twi’lek server who slipped him a half-full plate of food out the back door of a kitchen; a rodian cleaner who turned a blind eye to his refuse-digging, warning him away when someone more powerful came along. He never knew how to respond, but he didn’t forget those moments, either.

He kept moving, regardless. Slept only when he could find somewhere shielded from scanning. Most of the time, he relied on fear or anger or desperation to keep him moving, dragging on the Force. He tried not to notice how he, and it, were getting weaker the longer this went on.

By the time his Master had caught up to him, he had been running for so long that he didn’t know how to stop, not really. His ribs could have been counted by sight, under his patterned skin. He had no real concept of day or night. Or what warmth or being rested felt like.

Or if any of that even mattered in the first place.

He had gotten the droids, but the sear of a lightsaber across his midsection, cutting skin and muscle, was his first realization of how bad it was; the second was the Force choke that left his throat so bruised he could barely breathe after release, let alone growl; the third, his scrambling attempt to flee again, and the blade that slid through his ribs and into his side without resistance.

Nothing in him left to scream. In the last moment, he spat his own blood into his Master’s face, and then threw himself down a city level through a maintenance hatch, landing with the Force in a crowd of people who screamed and scattered, but not far enough for his Master to come and finish him off, not with all those witnesses and all that potential surveillance. Tried to stop himself from bleeding out, tried to move, to keep enough with the crowd for protection, despite their terror.

Then there was Kenobi.

 

 

 

He woke once to something in his throat; light behind his eyelids faint, dull brown. He tried to get at it, but his hands were restrained; he tried to get loose of whatever fettered him, but then nothing again. The second time, something took the thing in his throat away; he coughed, pain sharp and wretched through his side and middle, dizzy and cold and still unable to move, and then fell down again into some half-gone state, not quite so far as nothingness.

Something warm brushed across his hand; he gave it a half-hearted clutch, reflex or anchor, but in the reality he was not quite part of, his hand barely moved.

The third time, Kenobi was there. Maul tried to gather himself to get up, to bolt, but his body refused the attempt; he was covered in tubes and wires and a blanket, not enough to feel warm, but at least not exposed naked and vulnerable. His head still spun and half-broken thoughts of escape tumbled through his mind, but he already knew he was done.

He tried to swallow, then whispered, “Why don’t you finish it?”


	3. Chapter 3

Obi-Wan blinked, nonplussed. "What?"

It was definitely not the peak of eloquence, especially since all Maul did was blink back at him, looking every bit as confused.  Then the zabrak looked around the room, head a bit wobbly, before looking back at Obi-Wan. "Why _didn't_ you finish it?" he asked, voice still just a whisper, if a hoarse one.

"You were already hurt," Obi-Wan answered, cautiously, not sure where the line of questioning was going.  He was surprised Maul wasn't trying to strangle him, or at least bare his teeth, but perhaps he was still lagging from the general anesthesia.

Maul just looked at him, then over his bandaged torso; over the wires and tubes. "If I would not have been, _you_ would have hurt or killed me," he whispered, slowly but carefully. "What difference would it make?"

That-- was a surprisingly good question.  Obi-Wan certainly hadn't thought that Maul would just turn himself over.  There was every chance that a battle between them would have involved blood-shed or death.  "Well, as much as I pride myself on my lightsaber skills," he said, loftily, "I don't slaughter unconscious opponents."

Apparently, that wasn't the answer Maul was looking for.  He just closed his eyes, looking weary, before adding, "I won't be a prisoner."

"I don't see how you have much of a choice."

It wasn't the kindest thing Obi-Wan could have said, he knew; he hadn't forgotten that he had scrambled to get Maul here, to get him _help_ , nor had he forgotten all of the awful implications in the doctor's report.  Or his own promise to be here for his enemy, or whatever Maul was now. Or his own internal desire to get to the bottom of this mystery. He _could_  have just taken Maul to the Temple, the healers there would have patched him up and then he would have been brought before the Council and interrogated.  It would have been easy -- and far cheaper -- to go that route. It would have tied up all of Obi-Wan's loose ends into a neat bow.

But-- he hadn't done that.  Instead, he was sitting in a clinic, wiping out his entire expense account for the next month on medical care for the being who murdered his Master, and had no idea what his next steps would be.

Obi-Wan just-- needed to buy himself time, that was all.  To determine the best course of action, in dealing with his Master's killer.  It wasn't that he didn't trust the Council. It was just--

Well, maybe Maul would tell him who the master was.  Who had orchestrated all of this. That would serve justice, wouldn't it?  And it was likely Maul would resist the Council, or get himself killed trying to, and then the mystery would never be solved.  There would only be a dead Sith apprentice, and no closure.

"Just-- rest.  While you can. We won't be able to stay much longer, so-- rest now," he finished.

It fell on deaf ears; Maul was already back asleep.  But he didn't look peaceful, just battered, and Obi-Wan rubbed his hand against his own knee in an attempt to avoid picking Maul's up again.

 

 

 

Of course, given Obi-Wan's fortune -- or his impulsive lack of planning -- he was no closer to a solution by the time they had to leave.

He thought about the flop-flats maintained for the Jedi shadows, but the last thing he wanted was _Quin_ stumbling across Maul, or someone even more intimidating.  He thought about trying to rent a short-term rental, but he'd already spent credits that had been allotted to him for the entire next month, the ones that would have allowed him to buy food or incidentals, or rent space as needed on missions.  Admittedly, he didn't get away from Coruscant these days, but any credits unused at the end of a month just rolled over, and the balance that was added was variable based on it. He _could_ request more, of course, but that would require him to account for _why_ and he couldn't very well tell them that he had just spent everything he had on paying for medical care for the Jedi Killer.

There was also the fact that there was a premium to be paid for keeping it all out of sight.  The clinic was clearly a good one, and they were reasonable, but Obi-Wan knew that he'd been charged more to avoid the public-records scanning any public hospital would perform as rote.

That left him with a badly injured Sith, a datachip with nine different prescriptions on it that he didn't have credits to fill, no safe place to land and no plans whatsoever to fix that.

It was oddly exhilarating and entirely nerve-wracking.

Obi-Wan had been given his knighthood based on defeating the very Sith he was trying to help now, but Anakin had been turned over to the Council to raise.  Qui-Gon's death reverberated through the Order; he wasn't the only Jedi to die recently, but he was the only one who fell to their ancient enemy that the Council knew of.  As a consequence, Obi-Wan had been kept languishing on Coruscant, teaching classes to initiates and padawans sometimes, and other times acting as little better than a glorified errand boy.

Searching for his "monster" had been another make-work assignment, except-- well.  Clearly it had turned to anything but.

Maul was a little more clear-headed when he woke again, and he didn't speak nor put up a fight as the nurses and doctor unhooked him from the various paraphernalia.  Obi-Wan turned his back, but kept his ears open; they rattled off instructions about antibiotics and vitamin tabs and wound care, and he tried to remember what they were saying, even if they weren't saying it to him.  Then they left again, presumably to give Maul time to dress.

His clothing had been destroyed, absent for his black robes, but they'd given him a pair of sleep pants with a drawstring.  When Obi-Wan turned around again--

\--those tattoos really _did_  go all the way down.

He stood gaping for entirely too long a time -- moments, but they felt eternal -- but then, face flaming, he moved to help Maul.

The zabrak was so shaky on his feet that he looked a half-second from collapse, but he was trying to get his legs into the pants.  When Obi-Wan went to steady him, he took a stumbling step back and almost went down. That was how Obi-Wan ended up with a naked Sith in his arms and the sheer absurdity of that hit him in the head like a brick.  "You should have just stayed sitting to pull them on," he said, ignoring the rather feeble attempt to jerk away from him.

"Let me go," Maul rasped back at him, though he stopped struggling -- if one could call it that -- and held as still as his trembling would allow.

"I'll do no such thing."  Obi-Wan's face wasn't getting any cooler, but he propped Maul against the bed and then pulled those pants up, trying not to look any more than he had. "I didn't spend a month's expenses for you to end up wounded worse than you are by falling over getting _dressed_ , for frip's sake."

"I still won't be a prisoner."

The urge to snap something mean and condescending presented itself, but Obi-Wan managed to hold it back at the last second.  Instead, he finished tying the drawstring on the pants and tried to ignore the expansive white gauze and the red and black skin behind it.

Oddly, he was relieved that he couldn't see the scar left by the cut he'd won the battle with.

"You're in no shape to go running off back into the underworld," he bit out, carefully, grabbing the black robe and offering it, then standing back as Maul managed to get his arms into it.  It draped off of him, making him look--

Well, frankly, pathetic.  Too small for it, with his sharp collarbones and bandaged body.  He was going to be an easy mark for every low-life on Coruscant if Obi-Wan let him go.

"You don't get a choice on the prisoner issue," he added, making himself look Maul in the eye.  The red-and-yellow glare he got back was unnerving, but Obi-Wan didn't let himself look away, just pressed his mouth into a line before saying, more diplomatically, "I didn't get you help just to see you taken apart by some lower level hardcase."

"Just your Council?" Maul asked back, though it seemed more weary than challenging.

"Not by anyone," Obi-Wan concluded, and only later would he realize that he inadvertently included himself in that.

 

 

 

In the end, his only option was to call upon Dex again for help.

By then, it had been eighteen hours since he first dove into the underworld in order to track down a so-called monster who was scaring people.  Since that time, Obi-Wan had managed to acquire a Sith, an empty expense account and a great number of headaches.

He had other friends, but when it came to discretion, Dex was the best there was.  Ostensibly, he was a diner owner in CoCo Town, which was, like Dex himself, about halfway reputable and halfway not.  But Obi-Wan knew the besalisk was reliable and loyal, whatever his varied and interesting career prior to his and Obi-Wan's meeting.

The diner was relatively new; before that, Dex had run a donut stand, and it hadn't taken him long to procure himself the space for said diner.  Obi-Wan knew better than to ask questions as to how Dex had managed to raise the funds for it, because there was no way he could afford surface-level real estate by running a donut stand; instead, he took advantage of the fact that Dex would give him a discount on lunch when he was feeling badly -- Dex was seemingly able to see it on his face -- and the fact that Dex was connected in a million unseen ways into the information-brokerage network of the Republic.  Obi-Wan always paid, but he was happy to pay Dex for that information.

Dex did cook, and enjoyed doing it, and the diner was profitable, but Obi-Wan had no doubt that his information services -- however legal or not -- was what kept him comfortable.

Left with no options, Obi-Wan called him.

It was out of the question to smuggle Maul into the Temple.  Even though Obi-Wan knew of old passageways that padawans used to use to escape, sneaking a Sith into the heart of the Jedi was like sneaking the wolf into the fowl-pen.  Whatever had happened to Maul, he was still dangerous.

Or-- he would be dangerous, if he could stay on his feet.  He'd managed to walk from the clinic to the speeder, Obi-Wan behind him and ready to tackle him if he made to bolt, but before he'd even gotten all the way there, his knees had buckled and he was unconscious before Obi-Wan managed to catch him.  It would have been more worrisome if the doctor hadn't outright said that Maul shouldn't be moving around for at least another day, and then only very gently for several more; as it happened, Obi-Wan just dragged him back to the speeder and draped him in the back seat, feeling harried and a bit put-upon.

He stopped at a drive-through storage locker, used the credits left in his pocket to pay for it, and left Maul's crudely repaired saberstaff in it; there was no way he was returning the weapon to Maul, but nor was he going to take it back to the Temple or anywhere else.

Then he called Dex.

The diner was open day or night, but Dex didn't work all day every day and while he was a little surly about being woken up, he agreed to meet Obi-Wan at his residence and gave the address.  It was a nice -- if small -- place only a city block from the diner; Obi-Wan had never been there, but at least there was twenty-minute parking at the balcony that served as a delivery and landing platform.  He pulled up just as light was starting to creep into the sky, only now feeling how damned _tired_ he was.

Dex looked alert, even for the hour; the open doors of the apartment let the smell of fresh caf drift out.  Even though Obi-Wan was largely a tea-drinker, the smell drew him. "Dex, I'm sorry for imposing like this, but--"

"You're not that sorry," Dex said back, his lilt keeping the words lighter in tone.  He waved his lower right hand in a dismissive way, while the upper clutched a caf mug that was nearly as large as Obi-Wan's head. "Who are ya rescuing?"

It occurred there that there was a deep, strange irony to Obi-Wan rescuing a pathetic life-form, when said pathetic life-form killed the man who had done that to Obi-Wan's grumbling less than a year ago.  He gaped for a moment, but he didn't know how to say it, so he just moved aside and gestured to the zabrak in the back seat; he'd never told Dex _who_  had killed Qui-Gon, though he supposed he should get honest quickly, if he was asking for his friend's help. "He's-- he's the--"

"A Nightbrother?" Dex asked, sounding-- genuinely startled.  Probably for the first time since Obi-Wan had met him. "What are you doing with a Nightbrother?"

Once again, Obi-Wan found himself nonplussed.  This was getting to be a frustrating cycle. "--what?!"

 


	4. Chapter 4

Maul had no idea where he was.

Waking up was even less pleasant this time around, without the buffer of whatever painkillers he'd been given before. Every breath seared through his side, sent soreness through his midsection, and produced a constant ache in his throat. Not enough to lament it, but enough to stay still for the time being as he tried to get his bearings.

His Master had intended to make him immune to pain, and while not always successful, Maul could harness it or ignore it as needed often enough.

Something was shining on him, but intermittently. He was not cold, though he wasn't exactly warm. He could feel the Force again, enough to stretch out with it, though it remained fuzzy and indistinct. Still, he could sense Kenobi nearby, a bright if eddied presence. Someone else, not as bright, more shaded. Small pinpoints of life very near. And beyond that, the constant background 'noise' of Coruscant.

He remembered when his Master had first brought him here. He was fifteen, or somewhere in that vicinity; now, eight years ago. The sheer number of people living on this world, crammed onto it, was almost unbearable. It had taken him awhile to get used to blocking out the psychic noise of them, the constant pressure. Even in the Works, as relatively deserted as it was, it was still so _loud_.

It was as much survival mechanism to learn to block it out as anything. He would have gone mad, if it had been constant.

He rotated his wrist, testing to see if he was bound, and found he wasn't. He was laying on something considerably softer than most places he'd been lately, and covered over with his own robe and apparently with Kenobi's, if the scent was any indicator. That made Maul furrow his brow, though he still didn't try opening his eyes yet.

 _What are you doing...?_ he wondered, in the Jedi's direction, frowning. Nothing about any of this made sense. He had fully expected Kenobi to kill him, or at least take him back to the Council. But this didn't feel anything like what he thought the Temple would feel like. And if the man had wanted revenge, then he probably wouldn't have bothered doing any of what he had done. Maybe he needed Maul to be in decent shape for a long, drawn-out kind of revenge, but even that didn't slot neatly together.

It was baffling, and unnerving, and Maul hadn't the first clue what to do with it.

First, he supposed, he should at least get his eyes open. It took a little work, and when he did manage to, all he got was a flash of green and sunlight before they closed again of their own accord, though this time in response to the brightness. After another minute, he tried again and found he was in--

\--a greenhouse?

Plants spilled out of hanging pots, those that weren't standing next to the-- bed, or cot, or whatever it was he was on. Most of them were green, though a few were red or orange. The air was humid, though not unpleasantly so, and when Maul finally turned his head enough, he realized that it was a small space, only barely big enough to fit whatever it was he was laying on.

He was still dizzy, even on his back, but looking for escape was instinctive and he took in the long, sliding transparisteel door between himself and the rest of the dwelling; there was no exit on the side that overlooked the street. Past the door was more dim, and he could barely make out the cream of the Jedi's tunic and leggings probably thirty feet away. Sure enough, Kenobi's cloak was laying over his own, both of them covering him from chest down.

Escaping in this condition was guaranteed to fail, something that caused frustration to well. Even if Maul could get enough of a grip on anger and pain to fuel a Force-assisted attempt, it wouldn't hold long enough for him to get anywhere useful.

He ground his teeth and it was then that he caught the sound of voices.

"--know, Dex. Someone's been beating on him his entire life, given what the doctors said," Kenobi was saying, subdued. "What a dire mess this is."

Instantly, Maul tried to snap back, "It was _training_ ," but all that came out of his throat was a miserable little croak, more air than noise. Still, it annoyed him enough to make an attempt to get up, not wanting to look any more pathetic and weak than he already did.

He succeeded for less than two seconds, before thumping back down with a seething hiss of pain, the intensity of it shattering his concentration, the Force slipping his grasp. His head spun even worse for a moment, unconsciousness tugging the edges of his mind, and the sheer frustration grabbing the base of his throat.

The sound of the door sliding open, bringing with it a blast of cold air, just made it even worse. And Kenobi's voice was the topper on what was an already bad situation: "Well, it's about time for you to take your antibiotics, so I suppose it's good you're awake."

"It was training, not-- not beating," Maul said back, albeit barely above a whisper and with that same rasp, forcing his eyes open again just so he could direct a glare at Kenobi, lip curled.

Kenobi arched an eyebrow. "Really? Out here in the civilized galaxy, we call it 'abuse'."

 _Of course you would think that, Jedi, given how soft your Order is._  Maul wished he could properly say that, because attempting to whisper it wouldn't have nearly the correct tone. He also wished he could cross his arms. He had to settle for continuing to glare.

"Pity you can't bore holes into people with that look, isn't it?" the Jedi asked, sitting on the edge of the cot and getting entirely too close to Maul. "Anyway, you're at my friend's apartment. He also was kind enough to pay for your prescriptions. Since you lost half a spleen and a third of your blood, prideful refusal to take them will end up with you septic and then dead. And if you've managed to survive this long, I don't think you want to die such an ignoble death, so I'd recommend you just take them and-- plot escape quietly for awhile as you heal. If we'd wanted to hurt you, we would have, so just pretend to be reasonable for the next few weeks before you make a bid for escape."

That covered everything Maul might have argued, leaving him at a loss. And he was starting to feel foolish being speechless and reduced to nothing but a glare to get his point across. He bared his teeth, profoundly frustrated, and then closed his eyes again.

Feeling helpless was worse than pain.

 

 

 

When push came to shove, Maul had relented. Most of that was down to the besalisk. Maul had no desire to resist a being whose hands could probably rip him apart limb from limb without much effort, and the besalisk was an unknown quantity anyway. Friendly enough, though reserved for his species. He'd said his name was Dex. He was matter-of-fact about the whole thing, further removing any urge Maul might have summoned up to be rebellious.

It was mortifying being _helped_  -- helped to sit, helped to hold a cup of something hot, salty and fishy, helped to hold five different pills and painstakingly swallow them one at a time -- and that mortification kept Maul silent the entire time, wanting very much to just vanish. In some ways, he preferred the underworld to this; at least there, he was on his own, for better or worse. Everything was low and foul when one went deep enough, until appearances and pride became nonexistent and therefore not missed.

Far more than Maul hated pain, more than he even hated failure, he hated feeling _shame_ ; even if shame often resulted from the prior two, it made everything exponentially worse. Shame for his weakness. Shame for whatever deep-buried part of him wanted to respond to the kindness. Shame in _himself._

Apparently, one of those pills had been a powerful sort of painkiller. He would have refused it, had he known. After about twenty minutes, though, the agony of breathing and sitting semi-upright started fading to the background as a heavy lethargy crept in to replace it. Before he knew it, he was drifting into and out of half-dreams, the sort that blended with reality.

"You look like a reject from a glitterpop band," he said to Kenobi in that labored way, at one point, the words just tumbling out of his mouth. Kenobi looked half-asleep, now sitting on a chair that had somehow been wedged into the greenhouse's small space, next to Maul and sitting facing him.

"What?" Kenobi asked back, confused.

"Hair," Maul answered, before his eyes slid closed again. Were he not on whatever heavy-duty painkillers he was on, he might have tried to calculate something meaner to spit at the Jedi, though words had never been his strong suit. But for some reason, the shaggy, ridiculous mop of hair was nigh-on offensive, though not so much as the stupid fluff and braid had been on Naboo. It had grown out enough to curl at Kenobi's neck some, to cover his ears and brow.

"Oh," Kenobi said, somewhere on the other side of Maul's eyelids. "Well, there's no shortcut to growing it out, I'm afraid. You can harp about my hair if I can harp about your metal-grunge aesthetic."

 _My what?_  Maul wondered, but he didn't manage to figure out what that meant before drifting into some deeper form of sleep.

 

 

 

Given how rarely he dreamed -- given how rarely he _slept_  -- it was startling what crossed his subconscious mind. Orsis, in particular, but other things too; the contrast between how Kilindi had treated him, versus the bullies who made his time there miserable. His Master, who deployed praise sparingly and shame liberally, but in perfect measure to get Maul to succeed and to feel every failure. Somehow, Maul was both special and worthless at once; he had never figured out how to reconcile those two facts. That he was special. That he was not even worth keeping alive and had to keep proving it.

The cruel, irreconcilable span between _through victory, my chains are broken_  and _you wear failure like a badge on your chest, apprentice_. While he was on the run in the underworld, Maul had tried to reconcile it all and failed to. He only knew that he wanted to survive. And if he could not survive, then he wanted to die with some shred of honor.

_"Oh, poor Maul. All he ever wanted was a friend."_

His Master's voice, on Hypori. Even in his sleep now, Maul showed his canines, feeling the hot rush of shame and the hurt of it, different and worse than any physical pain he'd ever suffered, burrowed into his chest and guts. He wanted to scream back at it, and had he a voice, he might have.

Instead, there was something rubbing his shoulder and he jerked back awake, head foggy but clearing. It was night. The greenhouse was lit by some soft blue light in the ceiling, but otherwise was painted in shadow. And the Jedi was touching him again, with a look of--

Maul didn't know. Concern, or pity; he wasn't sure what the difference was. "What?" he bit back, voice a little better than it had been, though not much.

"You were having a nightmare. I thought you might want a way out of it," Kenobi said back. He sounded bleary, though alert enough. "Besides, it's about time for antibiotics again."

"You drugged me, last time." The words were accusing, clipped as he could make them.

"Until you can have anti-inflammatories, you're stuck with narcotics." Kenobi gestured, loosely. "Tomorrow night, you can have those. If you think I'm going to just let you lay here suffering when there's a method to alleviate it, you clearly need to realign your expectations as to this situation. Besides, even if you couldn't have, I actually listened to the doctors; you need rest, and you won't get that if you're in agony just drawing breath."

Maul wrinkled his nose, irritated. "It also makes me controllable."

Kenobi didn't blink, just said mildly, "That's not the intention, but yes, that's a useful side-effect. But again, if we wanted to hurt you, we could have."

"I won't take them again."

"You will, because I don't plan on telling you which pill it is, so by the time you figure it out, you'll already be on something non-narcotic." Kenobi frowned and stood up, though he looked more tired than severe. He sounded frustrated, but frank. "And refusing antibiotics is just fool-headed. I suppose that stubbornness has kept you alive, Maul, but it's only going to work against you now."

The really damning part was that Kenobi was speaking truth. Maul was in what appeared to be a safe place, the sort of place that he couldn't have even dreamed about for the last several months, where no one was going to shank him in his sleep. For that matter, a place where he _could_ sleep. His Master would not even think to look for him here. He could still escape -- they had made no effort to restrain him -- if he could just heal enough to clear his head, sharpen his connection to the Force; it really _was_  fool-hardy to ignore the opportunity to recover his strength. Maybe even steal enough credits from his captors to get a ticket off of Coruscant, which would up his chances of surviving immeasurably.

It was still a bitter feeling. Maul had never been good at manipulating people; he was only barely able to manipulate events, preferring a more straight-forward approach. Doing so never felt right, and it still didn't.

He just knotted his jaw again and turned his head away, mouth in a line, disengaging from the conversation and trying not to feel defeat all over again.

 

 

 

The besalisk wasn't there, so it was on Kenobi to help this time, and Maul hated it so much that he almost made it up to sitting on his own just on the power of that. But then there was Kenobi sitting behind his back, providing a back-rest, helping steady his hands around a mug -- tea, this time, instead of whatever fish-broth concoction of before, and absurdly sweet -- and the rage faded right back to raw self-recrimination. He stared at each pill, trying to guess which one was going to make him drifty again, and just like Kenobi predicted, he failed to figure it out. They were all of similar size -- too large for a desperately sore throat -- and when he bit into one thinking it might reveal what it was, the taste was so bad that he practically gulped it down.

"Plain food tomorrow. But you're lucky to be hosted by a fine cook," Kenobi said, as if the whole humiliating display was nothing. "Dex won't let you go hungry, and you might even put on some weight before you decide to try to make a run for it."

The word _try_  didn't escape Maul. He managed to finish the tea on his own -- it soothed his stomach and his throat -- and it gave him back a bit more of his voice, at least. "Then you'll take me to your Jedi Council?" he asked back, flinty.

"I'm playing all of this by ear, I'm afraid. If you're waiting for some master plan-- well, you'll be waiting forever, probably." Kenobi shrugged, sighing. "I'll make you a deal, Maul: I won't underestimate you, if you don't underestimate me."

It was the mildest threat Maul had ever heard, and made moreso by Kenobi's straight-forward way of saying it.

It was also incredibly effective.

When he fell asleep again, the Jedi sitting close, Maul still wasn't done churning the words over and over in his mind.

 


	5. Chapter 5

Strangest houseguest that Dex had hosted in a long time, that Nightbrother.

Not that he hosted a lot of company. Sometimes a friend would show up and need somewhere to rest, but those were rare times. Had a cot, though, since most of 'em were bipedal, bi-armed types, not too big, though he'd never set anyone up in his herb garden before now. But zabraks ran hot, and Dex's apartment was kept nice and cold and usually dry, like back on his long-distant homeworld, so the only place to put Obi-Wan's rescue -- or prisoner -- was in the greenhouse where he wouldn't burn off energy shivering, rather than healing.

Dex spent most every day sweating through life, so having some place to cool off and feel comfortable was important to him, anyway. The diner couldn't be, the streets never were, so home it was. Still made this a trickier situation, but Dex had a soft spot for Obi-Wan and unlike his Jedi friend, he knew what Nightbrothers were bred, raised and sometimes sold for out there far from the Republic. He'd never seen one, but he heard things.

Being a bartender or a smuggler or a gun-runner -- even a miner! -- meant hearing a lot of things, even when he didn't want to. At least being a diner owner in the Core meant hearing less about slaving; that was one thing Dex didn't ever dabble in nor want to.

Telling Obi-Wan that hadn't been any fun. That Maul wasn't just any run-of-the-mill zabrak hybrid type. Dex knew he was confusing the human's dilemma even more, but he figured that was probably gonna happen regardless. He wasn't highly keen on keeping the Jedi Killer around himself, but he knew all about desperate people in desperate situations, too, so until they knew more about how things had added up to this, he let his better nature dictate the terms. Time'd shake out what was going to happen there, and in the meantime, Maul wasn't going anywhere.

He'd left Obi-Wan minding the apartment yesterday while he went to the diner. He made it in time for the lunch rush, stayed through dinner, then went and talked to some friends a few levels down who worked the donation circuit. He came back with a box full of sweaters and pants and socks that'd probably fit the zabrak, so when Maul was able to make the trip so far as the kitchen table or 'fresher, he'd probably be warm enough. Came back with some blankets, too, after Obi-Wan said something about having to get another robe and that probably he was gonna hear about it from the Temple's quartermaster.

Once he was back, Obi-Wan had left for the Temple. Dex hoped he managed to get away again; he wasn't comfortable leaving Maul alone in the apartment, both for first-aid reasons and for plain common sense ones. Even if there wasn't anything of value he could get at. Unless a zabrak had some desperate need to steal Dex's prized meija plant, anyway, which Dex didn't think was too likely.

"Here, figure it's time you got up for a bit," he said, and didn't let the baleful red-and-yellow glare put him off. "Gotta eat something, move around a little."

Maul was an odd one. He didn't usually glare at Dex, so much; he glared at Obi-Wan, of course, but that wasn't a surprise. Instead, he didn't seem to know what to make of his host, and Dex didn't really want to know -- even if he had his (probably highly accurate) guesses -- why the scrawny zabrak stiffened up anytime someone went to touch him. He was glaring now, though, at least long enough to realize it didn't faze Dex any. Then he quit. "I'm fine, thank you," was apparently the answer he settled on; rigid, but oddly polite.

"Funny definition of fine you've got there," Dex just said back, casually. "Walking to the kitchen won't break you any worse than you're already broken, so ya might as well. Can't heal if you don't eat, y'know."

Maul squinted at him as if he was speaking some strange, unknown language. Baffled. Kinda cornered, maybe. Then he made the effort to get up, teeth flashing in a drawn grimace like those species-types did when things hurt, and since Dex couldn't really watch that without feeling sympathy, he stuck out his lower left hand and helped. Which was probably a good thing, 'cause Maul looked like he'd fall back again without the support.

"Probably burns like fire, but you're halfway there," Dex offered out, off-handedly. "Might do to get a sweater on, though, before you go the other half."

"This is _humiliating,_ " Maul ground out, after several moments where he was dragging in air, shallow breaths Dex could feel through the hand on his back.

Dex never quite got proud types, so he shrugged, even with one hand still holding Maul up and another one holding the sweater. "Really? With that hole in your side, I'd say it's bein' practical."

 

 

 

The attempt at stoic dignity was kinda painful to watch. If nothin' else showed Maul's age, it was how desperately he was clinging to it; hard to really tell otherwise thanks to the sharp lines and all that. And it was only long practice that got Dex good at guessing relative ages in other species, given the anatomical differences. But he seemed young as he tried to hold his shoulders square and get a sweater on without raising his arms above chest level and walk without support despite the shaking knees.

Still, Dex didn't help unless it looked like he'd hurt himself worse trying to do things on his own, 'cause if Maul was as humiliated as he said, then any little triumph was gonna help. Dex was glad his apartment was as modern as it was; the pre-programmed settings in the 'fresher to change configurations, for example, 'cause fishin' a damaged zabrak out of his oversized toilet woulda been awful for both of them. Or the chairs at his kitchen table, which reconfigured themselves within a handful of seconds for a different body type.

Maul had been resolutely silent, but for the occasional little noise of pain, and he didn't turn talkative when he sat down, either. Even just that short trip seemed to have leveled him.

"Here, you'll like this. Had it cookin' on the back-burner at work, let it simmer for hours and it reheats just as good," Dex said, setting the steaming bowl of nerf and barley soup down in front of Maul, along with a spoon that'd fit his much smaller hand. "Should be soft enough not to upset your stomach any. You want any seasoning for it?"

Maul stared at the bowl, blankly, then shook his head. Dex left him to it, then, turning back to the tarts and bread he had baking and the tea kettle he'd put on; just occasionally took a glance out of the corner of his eye, to make sure Maul tried the soup. After a couple minutes poking at it, Maul finally did, though it was slow goin' for how shaky he was.

"You probably got a follow-up visit comin', from that clinic. They usually don't charge for those," Dex said, after awhile, pulling the tray with bread out to set on the counter, the small loaves split on top, steam rising off of 'em. The tarts were still baking, so he left them to it. He wasn't all that big on grains himself, but he had neighbors who were, and there was also Obi-Wan, who never failed to appreciate a treat and who would be back eventually. "See how you're doin', and all," he added, as he transferred the loaves to the rack to cool.

He wasn't expecting an answer, but then Maul asked, quietly, "Why are you doing this?"

"Obi-Wan's my friend." It was the simplest answer to that question, though it wasn't the only one. Dex took the kettle off and made a mug of tea to bring over; he was kinda pleased to see the soup was half-gone. He'd thought he'd have to push a bit harder. "He asked for my help."

"What are you getting out of it?"

"Well," Dex said, drawing the word out as he thought about it, "I s'ppose I get the satisfaction of helpin' a friend when he needs it. We've got official business, sometimes, but that's different. Why ya askin'?"

Maul opened his mouth to answer, but then just shook his head and poked at the soup some more, shoulders rounding a bit forward. Dex didn't think it wise to press, though, so he turned back around and checked on the tarts and gave his 'guest' space to work it out, whatever it was.

He was chuffed, he had to admit, when Maul told him, "It was good, thank you," before making his painfully slow way back to the cot after finishing most of the soup and a little chunk of still-warm bread.

 

 

 

Dex had been telling the truth when he said he was doing it for the sake of his friendship with Obi-Wan. No point to lyin' about something like that. But he was starting to feel like he wasn't doing it _only_  for Obi-Wan, which he'd have to sort out, he supposed.

Besalisks were a social species. Dex was more reserved than many by practice, not by nature. He was careful how many people he let get close, and he didn't really put himself out of joint about what kinda careers those people had. He'd spent enough time doing shady things -- especially smuggling, gun-running and currency-laundering, though intelligence and counterintelligence had its place too -- that he figured not everyone who dabbled in the illegal and occasionally amoral was necessarily a _bad_ person. Those kinda weighty moral judgments bugged him. Some things were clearly within the realm of bad; slaving, for instance. But not everyone operating outside the law, especially laws made by a handful of powerful people, were necessarily bad people themselves, especially when it came to desperation or coercion. So, Dex didn't often judge 'em on profession, just on action as he could observe himself.

And a Nightbrother didn't exactly get a choice about their social status at birth; Dex had a hard time imagining, all told, that Maul had all that many choices about a  _lot_ of things.  And he knew something himself about what it was like to be judged on appearances or stereotypes; people who thought he'd flake on 'em, just because his own species tended to pack it up without warning and move on.  The friends he made trusted him, and Dex had earned it by showing otherwise.  He'd still move on if he decided to, but he didn't leave anyone dangling behind him in trouble when he did.

Obi-Wan was one of those friends, and also one of the few Jedi who didn't side-eye him all funny like. He just took Dex as Dex, and that kinda uncomplicated friendship was a good thing to have. Dex admired the Order, or at least, what he knew of it. But of the Jedi, he only really knew Obi-Wan, and that was because Obi-Wan was the one who'd taken the time to treat him as a person. Most Jedi Dex encountered acted so 'other' that there was no real way to feel like anything but small, beneath notice.

It was when Obi-Wan explained where he'd been most of the day that Dex was reminded all over again why he liked this Jedi so much.

"I lied," he whispered, sitting at the kitchen table huddled in his robes, with a mug of tea between his hands and a half-finished tart in front of him. "When the-- the Council wanted my report. I told them-- that it was unsubstantiated. That I got caught up helping people instead."

"What did they say?" Dex asked, surprised in some ways, but not in others.

Obi-Wan waved his hand. "Something about appreciating my desire to be compassionate to those less fortunate, but that I should refer them to the planet's social services whenever possible, that the Temple isn't a charity. I did have a few who spoke well of it, but a few others who didn't. There was also some talk in there about 'taking the wider view' and such. But they didn't suspect what I-- actually did."

Dex stroked his waddle, thoughtfully. "Closes the skyroad for takin' him in there, doesn't it?"

Obi-Wan only nodded, eyes downcast on his tea.

"I think it's the right thing. Dunno if that counts for much, but this situation's not exactly, ah-- _clean-sliced_."

"No, it's definitely not that." Obi-Wan heaved out a breath, glancing through the living area to the greenhouse. Maul was sleeping off his walk from earlier, with the help of narcotics; hadn't given Dex even a hint of trouble after eating, not even a glare. Then Obi-Wan looked back to Dex, and smiled a little. "I appreciate the vote of confidence. I just don't know what to do from here. I can't just let him run off and wreak havoc in the underworld. And someone -- I think his master -- tried to kill him." His face twisted into an expression of disgust, the kind Dex could recognize from various early culinary experiments with other humans. "Unless it was more so-called  _training_. But-- I don't think so.  Not as bad off as he is."

Dex rolled all four shoulders in an expansive shrug. "I'm not in a hurry to put him out, if that's what you're worried about. Can't keep shortin' my time at the diner, though, so we'll have to figure that out."

Obi-Wan nodded back, taking another bite of his tart and a sip of tea, before scrubbing over his face with one of his hands. He had some hair growing on it, enough to make it look funnily shadowed. "I think I can try to get away long enough to watch him during your usual working hours. I don't think the Council knows what to do with me, frankly. My knighthood was-- not gained traditionally, and I think they're concerned about my ability to work solo offworld right now."

"Well, if that's the case, you'll have to stick around here for the rest of the day. Make yourself at home, though." Dex got up, gesturing around to his apartment after stretching his spine and making Obi-Wan wince as it cracked.  He didn't feel guilty about saying it, just like he didn't expect Obi-Wan to feel guilty about coming to him for help. "Come earlier in the morning, if you can make it, and I'll make sure you have a good breakfast before I go."

"That's more than fair enough. I can tell them I'm-- I don't know. Searching for intelligence relating to events last year." Obi-Wan stood himself; he still looked tired, poor fellow, but at least Dex knew he'd be safe here, and there was plenty of food and entertainment, if he wanted to fire up the holo-projector. "I won't end up having anything to _show_  for it, but maybe it'll give me time to figure out what to do."

"That's all you can ask for, I think." Dex moved towards his 'fresher to change into his perpetually ruined work-clothes.

It wasn't a permanent solution, but a little bit of breathing room to find one.

When he left, Obi-Wan was back in the chair he'd wedged into the greenhouse, sitting and looking at Maul pensively, and Dex hoped his friend managed to find whatever it was he was searching for there.


	6. Chapter 6

_I lied to them._

The thought kept looping around in Obi-Wan's head, intruding on whatever track he was on in solving his dilemma, and every time he was unable to grasp the enormity of it.

Lying to the Jedi Council wasn't something he'd ever considered doing. Qui-Gon had always been able to walk the fine line between full disclosure and lying by omission, but it had often exasperated Obi-Wan when his old master had done that. After his own near-brush with the ArgiCorps, he had always thought he would be as diligent as he could be once he had become a Jedi Knight, to embody the Order's ideals at their finest. That he would be the best Jedi he could be, to justify the chance taken on him.

In the year since Qui-Gon was killed, he'd felt cast adrift in that.

Cast adrift in everything, really.

He was grateful, in a way, that his own anger over what had happened at Theed had burned down to embers and coals by the time he'd confronted Maul again. But even sitting there, looking at the sleeping zabrak, who was huddled in a very oversized sweater and surrounded by Dex's beautiful plants, Obi-Wan thought it was likely those embers would have rekindled into a blaze, had the fight gone as he expected it to. If Maul had gotten smug or vicious, it would have been all too easy to give into the pain and anger; to finish what he'd started.

But that wasn't what happened. Instead, someone else had beaten his enemy before he arrived, someone else had caused near-fatal damage. The realization that Maul tried to fight him in that state, bleeding out and starved, didn't make Obi-Wan angry; it just made something in him ache, something deep, even now that Maul was recovering. He wasn't sure why it hurt -- he owed nothing to the zabrak, least of all forgiveness -- but it did.

To be already beaten -- severely, almost fatally -- and then still ignite a blade and try to take a stand; what was it in a person, that would allow them to do that? It couldn't have just been the dark side. Maul wasn't stupid; he couldn't have thought he would have won. He had to have known that he would die fighting, but instead of trying to run or talk or manipulate or elicit sympathy for his injuries or anything else, he'd tried to fight anyway.

Obi-Wan still hadn't figured it out. He only knew it hurt to think of it.

It wasn't that he'd forgotten Qui-Gon or anything of the sort. Or his heartbreak at losing his Master like that, only to fail to train Anakin, as had been Qui-Gon's last wish. It was that his Master had been gone not quite a year now, and Obi-Wan had wrestled with it to exhaustion and resignation. There was no bringing him back, no way to undo the whole thing, and even if he had, he couldn't see any path to repair the trust that had been broken between them when Qui-Gon had nearly renounced him for Anakin. He still missed the man, still loved him, and still didn't ever really _understand_  him; Maul, though, was still alive. And in this case, he was still alive because Obi-Wan had acted to keep him so.

Dex's information about Nightbrothers had further muddied those waters. _"They only come from Dathomir, I hear. Born already slaves. And they don't leave Dathomir too often, at any rate; the Sisters keep 'em leashed tight, and when one does get sold offworld, they fetch a very high price,"_  Dex had told him. Obi-Wan hadn't known what to do with that, either.

When he had asked Dex what people wanted them for, the answer left him even colder. _"Used to be sometimes gladiators. Now, mostly bed-slaves."_

Maul clearly wasn't--

 _How would you know?_  Obi-Wan wondered, at himself, face heating. _How would you know where he's been or what he's been through?_

The cognitive dissonance there was that bed-slaves were usually better kept. Frankly. What good would they be if they were starved and their bones broken, when their primary purpose was to be pleasing in sex? A particularly sadistic person might take that road, but in the disgusting economy of the flesh trade, it would decrease his value--

That whole train of thought made Obi-Wan nauseous. Anyway, if that had been Maul's fate, he wouldn't have been trained to such lethal perfection, let alone armed with a saberstaff and cut loose to fight Jedi. Whoever had gotten their hands on him clearly had not been looking at him as an investment vehicle of _that_  sort, which implied that they were probably very, very well-off. If they could afford a Nightbrother just to train him to fight, ignoring his value in the flesh market, then they were certainly not poor.

Which meant the Sith master was someone of means. Great means.

 _How did you end up here?_  Obi-Wan wondered, taking Maul in.

Even in this condition, pared down to bone and sharper-looking for it, there was something handsome about Maul. His skin in daylight warmed in color to a vibrant red, and the black markings looked brushed across with the gold of Coruscant's primary. His horns were cracked and damaged, but if they were healthy, they would probably add to the appeal; the way they crowned his head so symmetrically. The black mask around his eyes only highlighted how vivid those eyes were when they were opened; closed, though, there was a softness there that stroked across Obi-Wan's protective instincts in ways he _really_  didn't want to contemplate.

All of these thoughts led to places he didn't want to go, but was rapidly running towards anyway: Maul had been born enslaved. Whoever had raised him had hurt him, often, enough to see the marks written on his bones. Whoever had raised him had starved him enough that when his adult horns had grown in, they had done so ragged and weaker for it. They had taught him to fight with great skill, but had extracted a great deal of pain in turn. And then, in all likelihood, they had tried to kill him. He had not gotten this thin in days or weeks; he'd been starving for months since Theed, hiding in the underworld, probably surviving on scraps. He hadn't managed to ensconce himself in any crime syndicates or positions of power, and if Dex knew what a Nightbrother was and was worth, then others might have too, so Maul would have had more than one enemy to survive.

Obi-Wan couldn't just hand him to the Council and wash his hands of this.

 _So I lied,_  he thought, a lump of panic in his breastbone. _Now what?_

 

 

 

"A little less glitterpop?" Obi-Wan asked, more lightly than he felt, a couple of hours later when Maul was awake again. Just to illustrate, he rubbed over his own chin against the bristles he was allowing to grow there. "I thought I might grow a beard."

Maul seemed a little better each time Obi-Wan had roused him; still in bad shape, but not critically bad. Definitely more alert. Now, his look of perpetual irritation faded into confusion, as his eyes skimmed from Obi-Wan's hair to his cheeks to where he was rubbing his whiskers. "To what end?" he asked, cautiously.

"I think it might make me look older and more dignified. I'm twenty-six, but people seem to keep thinking I'm just a 'boy' or 'little' or some such nonsense." Obi-Wan shrugged and picked up the covered bowl of soup he'd taken from the warming pot Dex had kept it in. "I brought you lunch."

Maul seemed to have no idea how to take the friendliness, which-- well, Obi-Wan was pointedly enjoying putting the zabrak on his back foot, so he found that quiet bafflement satisfying. After staring for another moment with that wide-eyed look, Maul worked on sitting up, and this time, Obi-Wan didn't try to help until it came time to push pillows behind his back for support. "The besalisk--"

"Dex."

Maul glared for a moment, nose twitching into a mild snarl. "--fed me earlier."

Obi-Wan raised an eyebrow. "Are you expecting to only eat once a day...?" he asked back, unsure of why Maul was declaring that.

It didn't seem Maul had an answer to that, which meant that likely the answer was 'yes.' Instead, he stared at the bowl Obi-Wan was holding out, making no effort to take it, before asking, "Why are you doing this? I know what the b-- what _Dex_  said, when I asked him that. But why are _you_  doing this?"

It surprised Obi-Wan that Maul had asked Dex anything, but not in a negative sense. It also occurred that when he wasn't trying to speak around a bruised and sore throat, Maul had a pleasant voice; the edges rounded off of it, smoothing and softening his tone. _Unfair,_  Obi-Wan thought, though he only frowned internally. "I told you that I don't have any master plans. But if you like," he said, ticking the idea over, "I might make you a deal."

Instantly, Maul looked even more wary. "What manner of deal?"

"I'll try to answer your questions to the best of my ability, if you'll try to answer mine the same." Obi-Wan could already see an angry protest brewing, so he held a hand up. "I won't push if you refuse to answer certain things. I just want your best effort. One for one."

"I won't betray my order," Maul said, resolutely, though even with the wariness on his face, there was a hint of curiosity as well that Obi-Wan latched onto. "Or my Master."

Obi-Wan offered the bowl again. "Then I won't ask for those."

It was a little hard being on the other end of so much distrust; the part of Obi-Wan that believed in the good he was doing in the galaxy wondered what he had ever done to receive it. He was a Jedi, after all; his life was dedicated to service. But a more realistic part of him -- left over from a bullied thirteen-year-old nearly sent to Bandomeer, while his bully was given another chance -- knew that trust had to be earned.

Maul took the bowl, carefully; his hands weren't as shaky as they had been. "You first, then."

It took Obi-Wan a few seconds to realize Maul was asking for an answer to the question he'd already posed. That Obi-Wan's assurance that he had no master plan had not been an acceptable answer. And he supposed he could see the point there. "I don't want you to die," he settled on, feeling uncomfortable. "I don't know why, exactly." Not wanting to dwell too long, especially with the look he was getting, he asked, "How long have you been training as a Sith?"

Maul also took his time to reply, and when he did, the words were clipped, "All of my life. Am I a prisoner?"

"In the loosest sense of the word, currently." Obi-Wan could see no point to lying about it. "You'll notice no energy fields, restraints or otherwise," he added, before pressing his mouth into a line and then finishing, "But if you want to know if I'd stop you from leaving, or if Dex would, the answer is 'yes'."

 _"Why?"_  Maul asked, frowning, brow drawn.

"That's two questions. But-- I don't want you to stumble out of here and end up dead. And when you are well, I don't want you to stumble out of here just to go kill people when I could have stopped you." Obi-Wan pointed to the bowl. "Don't forget to eat. Was it your master who gave you those wounds?"

Maul pointedly did not pick up the spoon he'd set on his lap, glaring at Obi-Wan all over again before giving a curt, "Yes."

It wasn't a surprise, but the confirmation helped cement things in Obi-Wan's mind, at least. "Why?" he asked, taking his next question.

That glare just got even more severe. "Because I failed to kill _you._  Because I lost to you, thanks to my own hubris. I was therefore expendable."

Ah. It took a little work not to wince at that, but Obi-Wan only nodded. Then he picked up the wrapped half-loaf of bread he had brought and unwrapped it, picking it apart to eat it. What sort of master would ever consider their apprentice 'expendable'?

Well, he supposed the same kind that would buy or steal a living person and then beat them horribly under the guise of training.

"What are you going to do with me, if you manage to keep me prisoner?"

 _I haven't even started figuring that out,_  Obi-Wan thought, regretting a little bit that he had proposed this deal, especially since he hadn't sorted his answers out. "I don't know yet," he said, frankly. "It won't involve torture or selling you to the highest bidder, though, so whatever it is, it'll likely be better than what I pulled you out of." He didn't give himself -- or Maul -- any time to respond to that, though, before asking, "Do you have any friends?"

Suddenly, that soup seemed to be the most fascinating thing in the world; where before, Maul was acting too prideful to give into hunger, now he picked up his spoon and stirred it into the bowl, looking down at it. When he did speak, his voice was quiet, "Not anymore."

There were so many layers to that tone that it made Obi-Wan's throat ache, and none of them sounded evil or cruel or threatening. Only-- heavy, and sad.

It kept him from asking more, for the time being. He just worked on the bread and gave Maul half of it, and didn't take offense when Maul laid back down and turned his head away.

 

 

 

"Brought some treats along, so you two'll have to come to the table," Dex said; his voice made Obi-Wan jump a little from where he had been dozing uneasily in his chair beside Maul's bed. The greenhouse door was mostly closed, to protect the plants and keep the warmth in the room, but it was cracked open enough to let Obi-Wan hear his friend's return.

It was late -- dark out now, absent the soft lights that fell on some of the plants and the ambient light from the city -- and despite being incredibly bored at times, Obi-Wan hadn't gone and entertained himself by firing up the holo-display. Instead, he'd tried to work on solving his dilemma, and got no closer.

Maul didn't have to take the narcotics anymore, so after his latest round of medication, he wasn't dozing off. But he had kept silent himself. He didn't jump when Dex's voice rang out, but he stiffened in his cot somewhat.

"We're coming," Obi-Wan answered for the both of them, pushing the door open and then turning back to offer a hand to Maul.

Maul -- of course -- glared at it and then sat up without taking Obi-Wan's hand; it seemed slow and still painful, but there was definitely a major improvement in how he was moving. Obi-Wan slid the chair back a little further and then stood back to wait. It took Maul a minute or two, then he pushed to his feet and tried to square his shoulders up; unsurprisingly, he nearly fainted doing that, blinking a few times and wavering.

Obi-Wan had guessed that might happen and got his arms around the dizzy zabrak, being careful not to squeeze even as he admonished, "Just because it hurts less doesn't mean you've got all of your blood and strength back. You need to go easy for awhile."

Going tense probably wasn't doing Maul any good, but he did anyway, stilling as much as he was able. "Let me go," he said, voice even and flat.

"Only halfway," Obi-Wan said back, slowly letting go with one arm, but getting his hand under Maul's elbow for support. "Falling over would mean I'd have to pick you up; which is worse?"

The now-familiar baleful look Obi-Wan got at that didn't put him off, but Maul didn't try to push him away or pull away himself. His jaw was clenched, though, and Obi-Wan didn't take the opportunity to poke any more. Tempting as it was, it didn't seem like it would be the kind or useful thing to do right now; it would just make Maul even less likely to tolerate any help despite him needing it.

Dex was laying out what looked like a fruit tray and spooning some dip into small containers. It never failed to amaze Obi-Wan how dexterous -- no pun intended -- his friend was, with his massive hands and huge arms. But all four of them were in motion right now; the bottom two were setting out plates from a stack and silverware, while the top two were spooning out the dip. It smelled good, even in the cold air of the apartment; fresh and sweet. "Picked these up from the wholesaler, that one that does special orders for caterin'. I use 'em sometimes and they call me when they got extra, so I get it at a cut rate."

"It looks wonderful," Obi-Wan said, sincerely, letting go of Maul only once he was within reach of the table and could put his hands on it to hold himself up, if need be. "Thank you, Dex. I can't stay long, but it'll save me having to go for a late meal in the cafeteria."

Dex shook his waddle at that. "Plenty of food around here, Obi-Wan. Help yourself, if ya need to."

"I'm hopeless in a kitchen, you know that." Still, it made Obi-Wan smile as he sat down.

"Even you can't fail at prepackaged leftovers," Dex said, in joking exasperation.

"Don't test fate by saying that."

Maul watched all of this, looking quite severe as he sat down carefully. Obi-Wan took the opportunity to grab the ladle and dump mixed fruit on Maul's plate, along with a cup of what looked like some kind of yogurt, and ignored the frown he got for it. Despite all of the glaring and unpleasantness, something about the set of Maul's shoulders kept his own tendency to be sharp under wraps, though. It was probably only pain, but it looked enough like anxiety and insecurity that Obi-Wan didn't want to make it worse.

"I've had a few of these, they're rather good," he said, pointing to some wedges of citrus. "A little sour to start and sweet to finish."

Maul didn't answer that, naturally. Obi-Wan wondered whether it was bloody-mindedness or just a complete lack of social grace. But after a moment, he carefully picked up the skewer Dex had laid out and speared a piece of something else that Obi-Wan didn't recognize, inspecting it carefully before trying a bite.

Just so as not to discourage Maul any, Obi-Wan turned his attention to his own plate. "If I'm not careful, you'll have to roll me out of here eventually, Dex," he teased, dipping the fruit in the dip and trying it. It was, unsurprisingly, wonderful; the intermingling flavors nearly made him groan. "The Temple serves fairly good food, but you're always a cut above."

"Store it for when ya need it," Dex said, chuckling and patting his own ample middle. "That's what works for me, anyway."

Dex mostly preferred various kinds of seafood for actual sustenance, but he'd sample anything. What amazed Obi-Wan was how well Dex managed to cater to such a wide, diverse range of species and palates; given that many different species tasted things differently, Dex's intuition and observation served him well at the diner, where his menu had something for almost everyone. Even his various pastes for the insectoid species were well-liked.

"Not altogether a bad idea." Obi-Wan smiled as he worked over his plate, enjoying the diversity of flavor. Out of the corner of his eye, Maul was doing the same, though more slowly and with no discernible expression. He did try the yogurt, though, and didn't seem to find it objectionable.

"I got a job for you, if you want it," Dex said; it took a few seconds for both of them to realize it was Maul he was addressing. "Nothin' big, but since you're already in the greenhouse most of the time..."

"What is it?" Maul asked, warily. It was only starting to occur to Obi-Wan that 'quiet' was Maul's natural state; despite the wariness, he was still very soft-spoken.

"Take the misters to my plants. I got bottles on that little shelf, you know, the one above the head of your bed? They got labels on 'em, and the colors on those match the dots painted on the planters, so you know which ones go to which plant. They're doin' fine, those plants, but if you spray 'em in the morning and evening, it'll be easier on me, not havin' to lean so far with the cot there. I can teach ya how to do other things with 'em later, when I got more time."

It took a few seconds; Maul looked-- confused, maybe, but not angry or anything at being tasked to something. But then, to Obi-Wan's surprise he agreed cautiously, "All right."

If Dex cared about putting a former _Sith Lord_  to housekeeping his greenhouse, it didn't show. He only nodded, like he'd asked a favor of a friend. "Thanks, I appreciate it."

There was something there that Obi-Wan thought was very clever, but he couldn't quite put it to words; something about the casual, friendly way that Dex had given Maul something to _do_ , all while putting no real pressure on him. And the way that Maul seemed willing enough to do it. Any which way, it had him eying his friend with new admiration, and when he had to take his leave -- carrying a covered bowl with him of more fruit and yogurt for a snack for later -- he was still contemplating it and wondering if there was an answer there, somewhere.

 _"Not anymore,"_  Maul had said, when asked if he had any friends. That he ever had was something of a surprise, but given his tone, it had not ended up well.

Obi-Wan was starting to think -- and maybe even hope -- that the answer might change, given some more time.


	7. Chapter 7

The good thing about switching medications was that it left Maul's head much clearer; coincidentally (or not), the bad thing happened to be exactly the same thing.

Kenobi had left, and Dex moved around his kitchen putting things away and getting ready for the rest of the night. He changed out of his grease-stained, food-stained clothes and into something clean and better cut for him, and sometimes he spoke to Maul offhandedly. It didn't seem Maul was expected to reply to it, because the besalisk didn't seem put off when he didn't; Maul didn't know what to make of that, just like he didn't know what to make of any of this.

He had never learned the art of conversation. It was, like many other things, something his Master had not deemed important. Maul had often wondered how -- sometimes even _if_  -- he would ever be let in on the Grand Plan, because no matter how useful he made himself on missions of intrigue and assassination, he was not trained in espionage beyond stealth, and he was not trained in politics or conversation, and all of those things would be necessary if he were to ascend as a Sith.

Unless his Master had meant to enact his plan in such a way that Maul would never _need_ to learn those things?

But the longer it went on, and the more Maul thought about it, the more he was coming to the conclusion he would never have made it to the end. He had been, as his Master had said often, a tool; an instrument for his Master's use and deployment. The bait and incentive that his Master had thrown out on occasion, that Maul could and would be more if he worked hard enough, could only have been manipulation and lies, and--

It had taken Maul a long time to figure that part out. Too long. It took fleeing into the underworld and being hunted like an animal for him to start to clue in that he really was disposable and that he had never been intended as anything but. That same impossible reconciliation, coming home to roost.

And some part of him hated himself for that.

That it had taken him into adulthood, to realize the truth of it; that it had taken his defeat and the stripping of any pride he'd accumulated to see the bare facts of it all. It sat like a stone in his chest; like gravity pulling his shoulders towards the center of the world. That he had never been strong enough, worthy enough or any _form_ of enough.

"Heavy thoughts?" Dex asked, breaking into his contemplation; despite himself, Maul jumped a little in surprise and wondered at his own apparent transparency. He had been sitting on the edge of the cot, too wound up to try to sleep more, even if his healing body was begging him for it. Like Kenobi, he had left the door cracked and when he was addressed, he carefully reached out and opened it, despite not wanting to talk. But his host -- it was getting harder to view Dex as a jailer of some sort -- had been kind to him, thus far. And Maul might not have been trained in conversation, but he did know what _manners_ were, even if he only rarely used them in his life outside of his Master.

"I'm fine," Maul answered, politely and automatically, pushing up to stand so he wouldn't be towered over quite so much. Of course, doing that led to the dizzy spell he was becoming familiar with; he got his right hand on the doorframe to steady himself, and he was-- grateful, that Dex didn't put hands on him, though the besalisk did reach out ready to if needed. "I should-- spray your plants," Maul said, after the darkness that was encroaching on his vision receded enough and he could get enough air into his lungs.

"Sure, just be careful bendin' and leanin'," Dex said, tone relaxed. "The nozzles on those bottles adjust, so you won't have to much. I got some herbal tea and snacks for ya, when you're done."

Asking 'why' to any of these things had done Maul little good so far; no one had any answers that made sense to him, least of all himself. Dex appeared to have vested interest in seeing to it that Maul was well-fed, and while that boggled him -- like everything else did -- he couldn't see any way or even reason to push back against it or question it now, when none of his prior attempts lent any clarity. As such, he just nodded and turned back to gingerly get the first bottle, while Dex headed back for his kitchen.

The plants were a little dry, probably because Maul had been occupying the greenhouse. He read every label and matched it to the correct pot, though reaching to the hanging ones reminded him of the hole in his side quite effectively and he had to pause often.

"When d'you want to go for your followup?" Dex asked him, after he had put the spray bottles back and shuffled his way to the kitchen. "I got a speeder, so getting there isn't a problem."

"Do I need to?" Maul sank down in the kitchen chair that he usually sat in, wincing internally at how much that sounded like permission-seeking. "I mean-- I appear to be healing correctly."

"Up to you," Dex said, with a shrug, bringing over a plate of some manner of finger foods, setting that and the tea down. "No one's gonna force ya to, but it's still a good idea to get checked out."

Having only rarely been tended to by organics, the idea of having someone he didn't know prodding around made Maul more than a little uncomfortable. He'd been treated for injury a couple of times on Orsis by their medical staff, though any minor wounds he handled himself. And he didn't remember most of what had happened a few days ago, in the clinic; in his dazed, post-surgery state, he'd defaulted to passive acceptance, something he'd had to learn at the hands of Deenine and Master Sidious because any flinching or pulling away was soundly punished.

"I'll consider it," he said, trying to sound brusque and only halfway succeeding. He stared at the food on the plate; some manner of leaf-wrapped rice with bits of meat and vegetables. It didn't smell bad, anyway.

"Give it a try, you'll probably like it," Dex said, settling in his own seat with a much larger plate. "'Cept for the rice, the taste reminds me of home."

"Ojom. In the Deep Core." Maul carefully picked up one of the rolls, almost surprised to find them cold, and inspected it before trying a bite; the textures were a little odd, but it wasn't bad. "That's why you have it cold in here."

"Yep. Haven't been back there in a long time, but I'll drift that way eventually, probably when I feel like settlin' down and takin' a mate. Not like I don't have time, though."

Besalisks were among the longer-lived species; their average lifespan was upwards of four hundred standard years, and they only seemed to suffer the ill-effects of aging in the last couple of decades of their lives. They mated for life with their chosen; both males and females were involved in the rearing of offspring. But despite being a comparatively small population, they displayed a great deal of wanderlust; there were likely more besalisks spread out through the galaxy than there was inhabiting their homeworld. Maul recalled all of that from his education; he also knew of the most and least effective ways to kill them, though he had not yet had any mission requiring it.

"Why did you leave?" Maul asked; Ojom was inhospitable to most species that didn't evolve there, but obviously that wouldn't apply to a besalisk.

Dex shook his waddle and chuckled. "Same reason everyone else does. Wanted to see what was out here, learn new things. Meet new people. Got all the way from Ojom to the Outer Rim and started kickin' around there; been a smuggler and a bartender and just about everything between."

"How old are you?"

"Hundred and eight." Dex paused eating and took a sip from his own gigantic mug. "No one ever taught you how to just talk to people, did they?"

That brought Maul up short and he stopped with a roll halfway to his mouth, eying Dex and feeling his shoulders go tense. The tone hadn't been mean; even in this state, Maul could-- sense that sort of thing, to some degree. Unfortunately, Maul had no idea how to reply to that question; he knotted his jaw and he knew he was glaring again, but couldn't seem to soften it.

"Just talkin', for talking's sake," Dex elaborated, gesturing between them. "I don't mind tellin' you all this, but a conversation goes back and forth, otherwise it's an interrogation."

This felt like a trap, not unlike Kenobi's so-called deal prior. "What do you want to know?" Maul asked, stiffly; he had no desire to talk about himself and reveal any other weaknesses.

Dex shrugged, maddeningly casual. "I dunno, anything. How old are you?"

"I don't know." Maul worked his jaw. "Twenty-three, by my best guess."

Even that felt like it was revealing an awful vulnerability. He wasn't sure why; perhaps because he couldn't give a certain number. But that had not been important to his Master, either. Maul's guess at it had been because he wanted to know where he stood when he went to Orsis; he had been smaller than all of the other cadets, even the youngest ones, when he had gone. It took him awhile to guess his age based on the growth patterns of the other cadets, including a couple of zabraks -- which, until the witch came for him, he'd always thought he _was_ in whole -- and he still wasn't sure if he was accurate.

"Gives you plenty of time to figure things out, then," Dex said, interrupting his train of thought, sounding-- approving? "How d'you like those rolls?"

Maul blinked, wondering how the topic changed. He also wondered if he looked as confused as he felt. "--fine. They're fine," he said, cautiously. "The-- the texture is strange, but-- not unpleasant?"

"I figure if ya like 'em, I'll make 'em more often." Dex stretched his wide mouth in a grin; given his facial anatomy, it seemed like an almost sinister look, but Maul couldn't sense any sinister intention behind it. "Teach you how to make 'em, too."

"Why would I do that?" Maul asked, squinting and feeling even more confused.

"Why not?" Dex asked back.

Maul didn't have an answer to that one, either. Instead, feeling unsettled and a little disturbed, he just finished the food and then took his own plate to the sink to rinse it, breathing off the dizziness until it passed.

He still didn't think he'd be able to sleep, but he went back to the greenhouse anyway, mind continuing to churn away and uneasiness dwelling in his gut, deeper than the cuts his Master had left on him.

 

 

 

"I've been _trying_  to warn you, but--"

"Obi-Wan. No sense in makin' a point after it's been made, is there?"

Dex's voice was some mix between admonishing and affectionate, whereas Kenobi's had been exasperated. Maul tried to shake the cobwebs out of his mind and found his head was on something soft and decidedly warm, compared to the cold air around him; once he realized that something was _Kenobi_ , he scrambled to sit up before even getting his eyes open despite the sharp pain that accompanied such a motion.

A very large hand on his chest stopped him, though gently; he blinked through the haze to find Dex looming over him. Again. "Not so fast. Not unless ya want another trip to the floor."

The floor, Maul thought, would be preferable to Kenobi's lap. Especially since the Jedi was giving him a very hard look right now, mouth in a line, peering at Maul upside-down. "You're anemic. The doctors said it would be three weeks before you'd even _start_ to recover from that alone, never mind the rest of it. What were you thinking?" Kenobi asked, voice severe enough that Maul wanted to make another attempt to get up and away from him.

"I was trying to _help_ ," Maul snapped back; his head was clearing, though more slowly than he liked.

After a restless night, mind circling too much to allow him to sleep, Maul had gotten up early; since Dex had been feeding him and giving him a place to sleep, he thought he should do something to pay the besalisk back. And since Dex had not named anything he needed, specifically, Maul had decided to make tea -- he had some rough idea when Dex would wake and had already figured out what he liked to drink -- and to clean the kitchen, doing the few dishes left over from the night before and wiping down the countertops. Used to being dizzy anytime he was on his feet, he just breathed it off each time, ignoring it otherwise.

Apparently, he had ignored it getting worse, as well. One moment he was putting his hands on the counter to support himself long enough for it to fade, and in the next, he was waking up on the floor with his head in Kenobi's lap.

"If ya really want a job that bad, I can find somethin' you can do sitting," Dex said; he was still dressed in sleep clothes, and Maul realized he had probably woken his host up. Though he didn't know when Kenobi showed up. "Probably make my servers' nights, if I bring home the silverware to wrap," Dex added, finally taking his hand away.

Maul took that as permission to get up and didn't waste any time in the attempt, frustrated by the fact that Kenobi got hands on his back and helped and further frustrated by the way his vision dimmed and his hearing faded until he'd managed to catch his breath again, still sitting on the kitchen floor. "I'll do it," he said, mostly in the hopes of ending this entire interaction.

"All right," Dex agreed, with the same nearly-maddening patience he'd displayed since the beginning of this. Then he reached out slow -- slowly enough for Maul to back up, even if backing up would have left him in Kenobi's lap again -- and wrapped his hands around Maul's upper arms, pulling him to his feet and steadying him as the next wave of dizziness rolled over him. "Don't go thinkin' it's an obligation, though. If you're feelin' particularly bad one night, comm me and let me know."

That was highly unlikely to happen. Still, just to get out of this situation, Maul nodded back. Once Dex let him go, he managed to get around Kenobi and head back to the greenhouse, feeling the Jedi watching him the whole way there.

He closed the door entirely this time, not wanting to overhear anything -- a failure of self-protection and recon if there ever was one -- and sat on the bed, mixed up and exhausted and anxious all at once, and unsure of how to fix any of that.

 

 

 

Exhaustion finally won out, but sleep wasn't restful.

Maul had long given up not taking his various medications as they were handed to him. The worst part was that Kenobi was doing the handing while Dex was out working, and getting the critical eye from the Jedi every single time made Maul want to snap at him. But that would prolong their engagement with each other, and that was the last thing Maul wanted right now. So, when Kenobi handed them off, Maul took them with water and then finally laid down and found the most comfortable position he could, trying to let _go_ of everything in his head long enough to get away from it all.

At least this time, Kenobi stayed out of the greenhouse. Apparently, he didn't feel it necessary to sit at Maul's side anymore; Maul could feel the Jedi's attention when it landed on him, like a buzz against his skin, but it was better than the constant presence.

It seemed to him that the better he got, the more angry Kenobi was. Maul didn't know what that meant, either. Or, if not angry, then-- impatient, maybe. It was unnerving, and moreso was the instinctive desire Maul had to _mitigate_  that impatience. To somehow disarm it, and to make it so that it wouldn't be aimed at him anymore. To make it so Kenobi would stop looking at him like he was an errant child or worse, even if that meant acting in an appeasing manner.

That thought made him curl his lip at himself, and fight down the urge to turn on his side and draw his knees up.

He shouldn't care what Kenobi felt about him. He shouldn't care what _Dex_  felt about him. Somehow, unwittingly, he had found himself caring about both of those things and he hated it and found it frightening in equal measures.

He tried to sleep, but only managed to drift uneasily. Sometimes he went deep enough to not think, but just as often he came back up and floated in the surreal landscape of a pleasant environment meeting an unsettled mind. Every time he felt Kenobi's attention land on him, he went tense.

 _I need to get out of here,_  he thought, but where would he go, without boots or weapon? He had clothing, thanks to Dex. He couldn't bring himself around to the idea of stealing from his host, though, so he had no credits. And he couldn't stand for very long without tempting a collapse. Where would he go?

He tried to think of an answer, until finally falling into a deeper, though still uneasy sleep.  And he still had none hours later, when Dex came back.

But the sense of the besalisk returning calmed something in him that he didn't know how to identify; enough that he cracked the door, ready to get up if Dex asked him to work. Maybe even eager for a chance to do something, to prove some value to Dex.

It was then that he heard Kenobi saying, "--quiet all day. But the more he recovers, the more I have to consider what to do with him in the long-term."

Dex made a considered sound. "We're no where near that, yet, Obi-Wan. I'd say just worry about leavin' him to heal for now. He's not bad company, either, so I'm fine enough with him doin' it here."

"He killed my Master, Dex. He might not be dangerous right _now_ , but he will be soon enough. You can't trust him." There was a long beat there; unseen, Maul bared his teeth to himself in response to the words. Then Kenobi continued, "I-- I don't think he asked for all that's happened to him, but even if he's not cruel by nature, he's half or more feral and unpredictable for it."

It was enough to get Maul to force his mouth into a line, the sharp sting he felt at that.

He closed the door again quietly and then breathed through his teeth, and therefore didn't hear Dex firmly give Obi-Wan an earful over that.


	8. Chapter 8

Dex had gotten the feeling Obi-Wan wasn't havin' the best time of it before he'd left for the diner, but there hadn't really been time to get into it. There was just something _off_  about his young friend that manifested in a terseness that was unexpected; Obi-Wan could be hard sometimes, but there was a different quality to this, especially in how he was lookin' at and acting towards Maul.

Still, Dex had to go to work. Beyond being his diner's owner and main short-order cook, the diner was also where he usually met with informants and traded information, so both sides of his financial planning hinged on his presence. He couldn't really skip days too often. He tried to put it out of his mind, and mostly managed to; he didn't think it too likely anything bad was gonna happen at the apartment while he was gone, anyway.

Of course, that only lasted until the work day ended, and now Dex was staring at Obi-Wan, dismayed. "He's not an _animal_ , Obi-Wan," he said, and it'd be lyin' to say he wasn't aghast at what his friend just said and how, as Obi-Wan looked up at him with something sharp and maybe desperate in his expression.

Though, when Dex said that, Obi-Wan broke eye contact and pressed his lips together before saying, "No, but he--"

"No nothin'." Dex didn't typically interrupt, but he couldn't let that go. "He's given me no trouble. Been quiet and polite and helpful as he could be, given circumstances. What good's there in talkin' about him like he's a rabid akk? What good's there in _treating_  him like it?"

"I haven't been, I'm just aware of the risks and I think you should be, too," Obi-Wan tried to say, firmly, but his face was flushin' red and so were his ears.

"Sure what it sounded like to me, just now." Dex didn't take his attention off the Jedi, as he folded both sets of arms. "You were doin' it earlier, too, talkin' down to him." He shook his waddle out, then. "What's goin' on with you? You weren't actin' this way yesterday. You seemed happy when you left."

Obi-Wan was still ducking his gaze, though the way he breathed out and the tightness of the sound tugged on Dex's feelings. At first, it didn't seem like he was going to answer, but then he said, "I've been-- there's this growing sense of-- of foreboding. And danger. I had a nightmare last night and that feeling's been dogging me since. And it's-- it's centered on him, Dex, I'm sure of it. I don't know if it's the Force trying to warn me, or if I'm just giving into common sense, finally, but I can't help feeling it."

The thing was, Dex did believe in the Force, and he absolutely believed in the Jedi as interpreters of it. His first instinct on hearing Obi-Wan -- who he trusted and cared for -- saying something like that was to believe him and to look again at Maul, and at keeping Maul under his own roof. But he shook that thought off a moment later. He believed Obi-Wan was feeling all that, but it was less certain whether it really was the Force, or whether the weight and stress of what he'd chosen to do was finally coming in to land on him.

It wouldn't do to be dismissive of it, though, just like it wouldn't do Maul any good to treat him like something hostile and toxic. "Can't really say anything about the Force, if that's what it is," Dex said, tone more considered and soft. "But like I told you, he's no trouble. He wasn't tryin' to escape earlier, he was makin' tea and wipin' the counter and doin' dishes. I'll bet that once you're gone, he'll be out here wrappin' silverware for me, too. What was the nightmare?"

"I don't remember, exactly, except that it was about this. This situation. I just-- I need you to be careful." Obi-Wan crossed his own arms, tight, glancing up to meet Dex's eyes, then away again. "I don't really have any friends left around, my agemates are all off fulfilling their knighthood, and the only friend I have who-- who knows what I've done is you. I don't know if I could bear the guilt if you get hurt because of my choices. Or if I lost you because of them."

"If it helps, it's my choice, too." Dex finally reached out and patted Obi-Wan's back, gently. "I coulda told you no. I still could. But I don't plan to or want to."

He didn't know if it actually helped, if it made Obi-Wan feel better, but Obi-Wan nodded after a long moment, heaving out a sigh that sounded tense and worried, but not as sharp. "Just be careful?"

"I will be." It cost him nothing to give his friend the reassurance, and it was good to see a little of the tension removed from Obi-Wan's face as he left, taking with him the boxed dinner Dex had brought home from the diner, one of two he had nested in the top of a crate of silverware and napkins.

 

 

 

It took awhile for Maul to make it out to the table after Obi-Wan left. He stopped in the 'fresher and came back newly dressed in the clothes Dex had brought him, still damp from washing up as well as his injuries would allow, and sat down without a word; for a few moments, he let his attention wander across the stacks of silverware and napkins Dex had set out, and then -- to Dex's honest surprise and delight -- he got to work grouping and wrapping them without any instruction, a little slow and clumsy at first, but correctly.

Dex had made Maul up some dinner at the same time he had Obi-Wan, just before leaving the diner in the hands of his night crew; barbecued nerf cubes (hold the hot spices), steamed butter spinach, cheesy sliced shalahs, and a mango/meija smoothie with a scoop of protein and vitamin powder added in, all the things he'd give someone to build their strength and weight once they could manage to eat it. But since Maul went right to work, Dex put it into the warmer for him and sat down opposite, resting his upper forearms on the edge of the table to watch. "That's pretty good. You work in a kitchen before?"

Maul startled a little at being addressed, then glanced up briefly before turning back to his wrapping. "Yes. I was a dishwasher for awhile at-- at the school I was attending. This was the last thing I did at the end of the night."

It was completely unexpected, and it made Dex laugh; the happiness of the sound was undercut a little by the desolate look on the zabrak's face and in his eyes, but it was still real. "Shame I couldn't hire you sooner, then. Bet you're even faster when you're not hurt."

"I'm fine." The reply was so automatic that it sounded almost robotic, even if it was kind of a non-sequitur.

Dex kept the frown off his face, though, not wanting to discourage Maul any. "Well, probably not yet, but you will be eventually. What school was it?"

Maul paused for a moment, hands frozen, then shook his head and went right back to wrapping. His hands picked up a little speed, too, though Dex couldn't tell if it was just renewed muscle memory or a desire to finish as quickly as possible.

Dex let it be quiet, not wanting to push too hard. No sense in makin' Maul feel like _he_  was being interrogated, especially when he'd answered Dex's question so quickly. Just that little thing was a bit closer to conversation, so Dex wanted to encourage it by not makin' it uncomfortable to answer things. Instead, he watched as Maul built a neat stack; once he had enough wrapped, Dex stood and lifted them back into the crate, into their proper section. Each one was for each species-specific set, and from what he could see, Maul knew how to do at least the first few without trouble.

"Want somethin' to drink on the side? I got a smoothie for ya, or I could put on tea," he offered, at length, after they'd fallen into the quiet routine for nearly twenty minutes. "Brought you dinner, too, all stuff I think you'll like."

Maul shook his head, eyes still downcast, even though he had such a good working rhythm that he probably didn't need to look at what he was doing now. "I would be fine with nutribars," he said, as his fingers elegantly tucked the folds into the napkins before banding them and moving on. "They're less effort and less expense."

"Taste like wet wood pulp, too, most of the time." Dex did frown there, closing one section of the crate off and moving to the next. "It's no trouble feedin' ya real food. Besides, I wouldn't be a cook if I didn't actually like cookin'."

Once again, there was no reply. Dex was starting to wonder if Obi-Wan had said somethin' harsh before he got home, but he wasn't sure how he'd even approach the topic when he could barely get Maul to talk about _easy_  things.

Still, even without a lot of direct feedback, he was figuring a few things out. Had been, really; can't live with someone without pickin' things up, even when they weren't spoken aloud, even when they weren't the same species he was. Mostly, what Dex figured out was that Maul was about as lost as a soul as could be, but he wasn't any kinda danger to Dex himself. Probably not even to Obi-Wan, now. He wasn't exactly an open book, but there was a refreshing frankness about him. A straight-forwardness. When he was mad, Dex knew it. When he was frustrated. When he was feelin' obligated and therefore needed to be given something to do so he wouldn't feel useless.

Right now, he just seemed very sad.

Dex watched him rolling silverware -- turned out he did know how to do most of 'em, only needed one short block of instruction -- and then when they were getting close to the end and Maul was lookin' kinda peaky, Dex went to get the food out and bring it over. "Learned this barbecue recipe out on the Rim," he said, setting the box down and putting the last of the rolled silverware away, "from a Chadra-fan. Had all his whiskers burned off 'cause he liked workin' with fire, the fur all around his face was singed all the time, but he was so good in a kitchen that the owner of the bar he worked at had the kitchen revamped for his size. Miniature everything. Counter tops I'd whack my knees off of."

It took a few seconds, but Maul finally looked up at him with his brow drawn, maybe confused. Maybe curious, too.

Dex took advantage of the attention and opened the box, setting down the non-diner silverware next to it, then sat down himself with some leftover rolls from the night before once he'd moved the crate out of the way of the table, though he didn't start eating yet, since he was tellin' a story.

"Now, I want you to picture me -- one of my hands was bigger'n his whole head -- learnin' how to cook barbecue nerf cubes in a kitchen made for a meter-tall pyromaniacal furball," he said, grinning and miming holding a small pan with the tips of two fingers, hunching his shoulders in and pretending to saute over an equally tiny stovetop. "Especially when he's throwin' jet juice in the pan without warning, sayin' things like, 'needs more heat!'" he added, then mimed an appropriately melodramatic flail, which was only a fraction more dramatic than the reality had been.

Dex didn't know if he'd been hoping for a laugh or not, but he'd take the little smile that he got off of Maul, especially since he was pretty sure it was the first time he'd ever seen it. It made him grin wider himself, before he wrapped the tale up.

"Anyway, next thing I know, _whoosh,_  and my first attempt hits the ceilin', my head hits it right after. If he weren't laughin' at me, he mighta kicked me out right there." Dex shook his head then. "You'll have to tell me how ya find it, since I got myself a concussion learnin' how to make it."

Maul blinked a few times, then looked down at the box like he'd forgotten that he was supposed to _eat_ , rather than just sit with it there. But after another couple seconds, he picked up his fork and tried a bite, chewing thoughtfully and then swallowing before saying, "It's good. Ah-- sharp? But-- a little sweet, too?"

"Do ya like food with some spice -- heat -- to it? If ya do, I can make it that way, too," Dex asked back, picking up a roll and popping it into his mouth.

Maul shook his head, then gave something almost like a shrug, a little tick of one. "I don't know."

"No bother, then, we can test that out easy enough next time." Dex pointed to the shalahs next. "These look like potatoes, but they're actually somethin' from Alderaan; high end kinda tuber, but well worth the expense--"

Dex ended up describing everything as he nudged the zabrak through finishing the whole dinner -- and the smoothie in the cup -- and he also managed to elicit an opinion from Maul on each thing, too, which meant the food was definitely a success, but the conversation was a genuine triumph.

And so was wakin' up the next morning and making tea and letting Obi-Wan in, and Maul sleeping right through it.


	9. Chapter 9

The thing was, Obi-Wan actually did remember exactly what the nightmare was. He just couldn't bring himself to say it. And it felt as much like a Force vision -- something he used to experience when he was a teenager on occasion -- as it did a dream.

It was only an image, suspended in time; Dex crumpled on the ground in his own kitchen with a smoking hole in him, his apartment ransacked, and no sign of Maul. It was visceral; the reality of it was so clear that Obi-Wan could see the number of dishes in the drying rack and the smell the bite in the air of burned skin and smoke. On the ground by Dex was an electric meat skewer, the type meant to slow-roast meat from the inside out, and it was blackened and stinking.

Beyond that, everything was dim and obscured by darkness.

Of course, he'd thought it possible that it was something outside that had caused it. Perhaps Maul's former Master; if the Sith was well-off and presumably powerful, finding Maul -- even well-hidden -- wouldn't be impossible. But the apparent weapon was a damning thing; a lightsaber wouldn't make a hole that small, but the electric skewer might.

A much more likely possibility was that Maul was the eventual culprit. He was right there. He was a confirmed killer; Obi-Wan had no doubt that his personal body count went well beyond some Naboo farmers (however corrupt it turned out they were) and Qui-Gon Jinn. Even without assigning any evil intent to it, he could see a dozen ways that Maul could end up hurting Dex. What if the desire to escape overrode common decency? What if something angered Maul enough? Sith drew on their darkest emotions, and even Obi-Wan knew what the struggle against fear and rage felt like and how seductive it was. Someone trained to give into it rather than resist it could well do so.

The 'what ifs' were the worst part. The first thing Obi-Wan did when Dex left for the day was search all of the cabinets -- quietly, because Maul was still sleeping -- and steal the electric skewers, stashing them in the inner pockets of his robes before folding them up on the counter by the door. There were four of them, and they were all identical; he didn't know if he had seen them before his dream, but he knew they matched. Then he went and pensively stared at the knives in the block, but ultimately left them.

He debated telling Dex about his dream in more detail, but the idea of making Dex miserable with worry kept him from it. For whatever reason, Dex had grown to care enough for Maul that he would take it hard if Obi-Wan told him in more detail what Obi-Wan's suspicions were.

His only other recourse was figuring out a solution to this whole situation as quickly as possible, and keeping an eye on his prisoner, watching for danger signs.

What Obi-Wan wouldn't realize before it was too late was that _he_  would be the one to lead the danger to Dex's door, and without ever meaning to.

Nor did he know then how far he would have to go in trying to change the outcome after.

 

 

 

It didn't help his suspicions any that Maul was acting odd.

He seemed to be going out of his way to ignore Obi-Wan; when he woke up, he was slow to get out of bed and he didn't so much as _glance_  at Obi-Wan, let alone give his usual glare. He managed to get to the 'fresher without reeling over, walking with great care, and then came out again smelling of some kind of mild soap and dressed in fresh clothes.

"Dex left you breakfast to reheat," Obi-Wan said, after the quiet had become so thick he couldn't help but chew on it. "And your medications."

Maul had been heading back towards the greenhouse, right hand braced on the wall that divided the kitchen and Dex's bedroom; when Obi-Wan spoke, he paused, shoulders going stiff under the oversized blue-violet sweater he was wearing.

Then, without a word, he turned back again to head for the refrigerator, still not making eye contact.

Obi-Wan should have been pleased by the tractability, but he wasn't. When he realized he was glaring himself, rather suspiciously, he made an effort to stop and tried to reconcile the part of himself that was wary and waiting for attack with the part of himself that felt bizarrely worried and guilty. It could well be that Maul had no actual plans to cause trouble or harm, and would only do so when provoked.

It was just figuring out what the provocation could be. Or would be.

Still, this silence was driving him mad. He folded his arms across his chest and leaned against the counter -- not too close, he thought, and not too far -- and tried again to initiate some kind of conversation. "It looks like you're moving better," he said, hoping he sounded upbeat.

He was met with another long silence, as Maul pulled out the covered dish with his name scribbled on the top in marker, in Dex's distinct hand. Then Maul went _all the way around the table_ to get past Obi-Wan to the warmer, even though there was plenty of room between the table and Obi-Wan himself.

Obi-Wan just gaped. In fact, he was still gaping when Maul put the dish in the warmer and set it per the instructions scrawled out under his name.

Maul didn't look over at him, but it was clear he wasn't oblivious to the scrutiny, because his shoulders ticked up towards his ears and Obi-Wan could see the muscles in his jaw jump as they knotted, even under the black skin framing them. "I don't want to talk to you," Maul finally said, voice sounding hoarse. "Please leave me alone."

Obi-Wan wasn't sure what surprised him more: Maul saying such a thing, or the 'please' attached to it. He blinked it off. "Well, I'm not going to do _that,_ " he said, wrestling with his own frustration and confusion. "I'm afraid you're stuck with me until I figure out what to do with you."

"Pick your cage, then, already," Maul snapped back, finally looking at him. "And get it _over with._ "

His eyes were blazing, but there was something else there, something Obi-Wan couldn't pin down. Anger, but not only. It put Obi-Wan on his back foot, whatever it was, and made the guilt he was feeling seem even sharper.

It also left him fumbling for some kind of answer to that. "I don't want to put you in a cage!" he said, sharply, throwing his hands up and then wincing when that made Maul jerk his head backwards. Obi-Wan tried to soften his tone there, adding, "I just want--"

But he didn't know how to finish that sentence. What _did_  he want? All premonitions aside, it was getting harder every day to view Maul as a true threat. Even though Obi-Wan, confused and mixed up and anxious about everything, wanted to continue to. But even remembering the smug, arrogant Sith Lord who had paced like a sand panther on the other side of that ray shield after murdering his master on Naboo wasn't enough to override everything he'd learned since.

"Why not?" Maul asked, at length, clipped, lips peeled back and teeth flashing and sparks in his eyes. "That is what one does with feral animals, isn't it?"

_Oh._

Obi-Wan sucked in a sharp breath, realization slamming into his chest and pooling like ice below it. "I didn't mean--"

"--don't _lie_  to me." Maul was in his face in an instant, quickly enough that Obi-Wan jumped backwards, heart instantly thudding hard from adrenaline. And around the Sith -- or ex-Sith -- anger roiled, radiating past his shields, red hot.

Anger, and hurt.

Maul straightened himself up again, clutching the counter with his left hand, even though using that side had to ache, and then he said, more calmly, as if his presence in the Force wasn't all heat and pain, "Don't lie to me, Jedi. You can afford me that much courtesy, feral or no."

He didn't grab his breakfast when the warmer dinged, either. He just walked past Obi-Wan, bolstered by the Force -- and still not terribly steady even with it to lean on -- and went back to the greenhouse, closing the door behind him.

 

 

 

All was silence outside of Obi-Wan's mind; all was chaos and distress inside of it.

He hadn't thought Maul would overhear him when he'd said that. Dex's rebuke had been embarrassing -- and Obi-Wan knew he had it coming -- but knowing that _Maul_ had heard that, and that it had clearly gotten deep under his skin, was somehow so much worse. It went from an embarrassing misstep to something far closer to cruelty than Obi-Wan was comfortable with.

It reminded him of his own boyhood.

The bullying that no one seemed to notice, when Bruck was at him incessantly. The name-calling. The way that those who were supposed to protect him from it either ignored it, or wrote it off as something he was supposed to be bigger than. Being passed over again and again. The way his own anger at it had been weaponized against him, until he was standing there, beleaguered and emotionally wounded and lost and _sad_ , waiting to go to Bandomeer. It reminded him of all the times he had curbed his own instincts, trying to prove he was good enough for Qui-Gon. And it reminded him of how easily it seemed Qui-Gon had left him behind on Melida-Daan; had abandoned him there. He knew better now, as an adult, what had really been going on with his master then. But at the time, he _felt_ that.

It reminded him of his master's last moments; asking him to train the Chosen One. On good days, Obi-Wan took it as faith that Qui-Gon had thought so highly of him as to ask him to train the most powerful Force sensitive ever seen.

But on bad days, it felt like being trapped on some course he would not have chosen for himself; of being used, heedlessly, to accomplish his master's goals while ignoring any of his own.

Sometimes, he still felt horribly guilty for letting the Council take over Anakin's training.

All of that looped back around to the overheard whispers, sometimes cruel, sometimes pitying, that he heard during his childhood. And that, in turn, looped around to the realization that _of course_  Maul had endured the same, either at his master's hands, or at those of his peers, and Obi-Wan had just done the exact same thing to him. Both in pity, and in cruelty.

It itched in his bones, the desire to explain and apologize, but somehow he managed to stay away from Maul as he was asked to. He boggled at how much he wanted to go and pour out his feelings, regardless of how vulnerable that would leave him.

Mostly, he was just sorry. And finally realizing how lost he was.

When Dex came back -- a seeming eternity later, but actually earlier in the day than he usually did -- Obi-Wan could have cried in relief.

"That bad, huh?" Dex asked, after looking at him standing there disheveled and distraught, before stepping to the side to eye the greenhouse in obvious worry.

"He heard me, yesterday," Obi-Wan whispered, and if he looked like he wanted to melt through the floor, then that would be a wholly accurate reflection to how he felt.

Dex's waddle sucked in, the besalisk's version of a sharp wince. "That bad, then."

"Dex, I'm sorry." Obi-Wan dropped his gaze, scrubbing a hand through his hair. "I-- I didn't _think_ \-- I didn't expect him to overhear it."

"If him overhearin' it is the part you're apologizin' over, Obi-Wan, then you're not aimin' true," Dex said, before moving over to the counter to put the bag of food he'd brought up on it.

Obi-Wan winced, but he knew the truth when he heard it. "No. I-- I shouldn't have said it at all. It was-- judgmental and mean-hearted, no matter how anxious I was feeling."

"Then maybe it ain't me you should be apologizin' to?"

The idea of trying to do so to Maul made Obi-Wan's guts sink all over again. But this awful silence and the pain he knew he'd caused was worse. "I know. I'll-- I'll apologize to him tomorrow. I know I should now, but he wants nothing to do with me, and I don't want to-- to crowd him after he told me to leave him alone." And, too, he hoped Dex would be able to help in the meantime; even only observing a little bit of their interactions, it was clear that Maul trusted Dex more than he trusted Obi-Wan, and not without reason.

"All right." Dex was regarding him when Obi-Wan looked up; Obi-Wan could see the sympathy there and thanked the stars themselves that he had Dex as his friend. "In the meantime, I brought ya dinner again. Might as well take it back to that Temple of yours, and don't go wastin' it 'cause you're so eaten up that you can't eat somethin' else."

Obi-Wan pressed his mouth into a tight smile, only half-felt, but touched nonetheless. "I will. I mean, I'll eat it. Thank you for bringing it, and-- for everything you've done."

"It's no bother." Dex handed off the box and Obi-Wan ducked past him to get his robe and slip out, taking the food and a great deal to think about with him.

(He also took the skewers, but he didn't realize that until he was already halfway to the Temple.)


	10. Chapter 10

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rough days are nothing new to Maul, but this one's different.

Maul knew all about miserable days -- and weeks, months and years -- and yet even he was surprised by how much so this day had been.

Kenobi had gone from irritation and suspicion to _guilt_ , brooding over his thoughts like a wild hen with too many eggs; they weren't particularly loud, not loud of enough to discern, but the emotional radiation kept Maul constantly on edge, hiding in the greenhouse. A few times, he pulled his own mental shielding around him like a cloak, feeling off-balanced and desperately uncomfortable, but then anxiety would make him soften it again, wanting to check in case things changed, and he'd once again be treated to the full effect of a likewise anxious Jedi.

If Maul had intended to make Kenobi feel guilty, that would be one thing. But he _hadn't_. He was no stranger to taking the opinions of others on the chin, and while he hadn't learned how to brush it off exactly -- at least, when he wasn't using it intentionally to add to his ability to intimidate in battle, anyway -- he had no issue accepting the fact that that was what Kenobi thought of him, even if it felt--

He'd just wanted the Jedi to leave him alone, when he'd snapped back. Now that Kenobi was feeling guilty, Maul wanted to get away from him more than ever.

It probably made him a poor Sith. His Master was an expert at emotionally manipulating others, but beyond inciting fear and intimidation, Maul had never learned how and had no real desire to. And when it was not a battle or a mission, inciting fear was a useful measure of self-defense; if they were afraid of him, then they weren't going to attack him.

Words, it turned out, were worse weapons anyway, and he was never very good at those.

So, he stayed in the greenhouse, too-- _everything_  to sleep, but since he wanted to keep away from Kenobi, all he had to do with himself was lay there and stare off past the plants into Coruscant's streets. When hunger twinged, he repressed the sensation, and then found himself in a looping worry about whether Dex would be disappointed in him for not eating the breakfast that had been left; then, too, he realized he'd left his antibiotics on the counter and everything else and the anxiety just got worse. So did the physical pain, and by the time that Dex did come back, Maul was not terribly far from being so desperate to break-- something, be it away or free or whatever else, that he was contemplating seriously whether he would be fast enough to get out of the greenhouse and over to the balcony doors and then over the edge fast enough to evade Kenobi.

He wasn't even sure he'd be able to arrest his own fall to surface level, but at that point, he didn't care.

Still, Kenobi left eventually and then Dex was knocking on the door of the greenhouse. Figuring that it was time for him to face up to whatever censure, Maul sat up carefully, then opened it and didn't look up.

"One of those days?" Dex asked, holding out the pills he'd missed with one hand and a glass of water with the other, in his sightline.

Maul wasn't sure how to answer that -- one of _what_  days? -- but nothing about Dex's voice sounded disappointed or angry, so he took both things, knocking back the pills with a sip of water and giving the only answer he had, which was a shrug. He didn't _know_  if it was one of 'those' days, but it seemed rude to not reply at all.

"Well, they happen," Dex just said, calm and sympathetic. "Here, c'mon and have somethin' to eat. Brought home another dish I'd like an opinion on."

Getting up was harder; pain shot through his body when he did, but Maul held onto the doorframe until it became manageable again. And while he did, he tried to think of how to explain his failure to do what he was supposed to do, though what he ended up asking was, "Did you bring back silverware to wrap?"

"Not today," Dex answered, keeping even with him until he was in his usual chair, then moving to get a covered metal bowl. That, he set in front of Maul along with a spoon and fork. "I came back early 'cause I was hopin' I could talk ya into goin' to the clinic for your followup."

Despite himself and any amount of self-control, Maul froze at that, hands knotted together under the table. Even to his own ears, his voice sounded thready when he said, "I don't want to."

"I know." Dex sat down himself, regarding him, and there was still nothing _unkind_  coming from him in the Force despite the way his words were making Maul feel. "I know ya don't. And no one's gonna make you. I know ya feel like you'll heal up right, and ya probably will, but I'd feel better if we knew that for sure, too."

Just the idea of going was making Maul's hearts race, but he wasn't able to ignore what Dex was saying, either. He didn't know _why_  it mattered to Dex whether he was going to heal properly, but there was no way to deny that it mattered to the besalisk; now that Maul had been around him this long, he could easily discern the sincerity in the request. And after steeping for a day in a brew of anxiety about potentially disappointing Dex, the idea of disappointing him over this was enough to make Maul _queasy_.

 _What is wrong with me?_ he wondered, plaintively, as he tried to calm the tremble in his hands. He had survived two decades or more being trained by a Sith master. He had spent months now surviving in the underworld, clawing for every scrap and moment. Going to a clinic for a check-up ought not be so--

So intimidating.

"I'll go," he said, as gruffly as he could. He didn't need coddled, he was a _trained assassin_ , he was not some frightened, weak child cowering in a room on Mustafar anymore. None of this should matter. Not their opinions, not their worries, not any of it; all he had to do was heal and disappear and give no more thought to any of this. He could find a way off Coruscant and bolt for Wild Space; find some rock to call home and never have to deal with any of it. None of this mattered.

For all that, though, he still only managed a few bites of dinner -- not even enough to summon an opinion -- and couldn't seem to get his hands to steady or his hearts to slow.

 

 

 

The ride to the clinic was soaked in dread, despite all Maul's efforts to make it not be so.

He tried to focus on the landmarks, tried to correlate them to his memory. Tried to reach out with the Force and sense whether there was danger looming. But all he could hear was the looping nature of his thoughts, spinning in ever tighter circles; everything felt like danger, but he couldn't get out of his own head enough to discern whether it was real. Dex tried to talk to him, but he couldn't seem to come up with anything to reply with; that just made him feel even more desperate, even though Dex didn't seem put out by the lack of response. It was early evening, the sun was still up; the clinic was just subsurface, though, and dipping into the shadows should have felt like a relief -- lurking in shadows had been his _entire life_  -- but it didn't.

"This should be quick," Dex said, when they landed. "If ya want, we can stop by the diner after, pick ya up somethin' you'll like more."

Dinner had been fine, what Maul could taste of it; his inability to eat it wasn't down to the quality of it. But he had no idea how to explain that, so instead he got out of the speeder and stood there clutching the door, pulling in air as quietly and slowly as he could. His knees felt more watery than usual.

 _Enough,_  he snapped at himself in his head. _Enough cowardice._  It was stupid to feel this way over a basic medical checkup. What was there even to be cowardly about? He wasn't afraid of pain. Pain was a lesson, and besides, it was these peoples' jobs to eliminate it, not cause it.

His head was spinning, but he steeled himself as well as he could and started towards the doors, forcing one step after another.

 _I'm fine,_  he told himself, severely -- as if thinking it would convince his apparently haywire nervous system that nothing was wrong -- when he crossed through the doors.

 _I'm fine,_  he told himself, more desperately than severely, when they checked him in.

 _I'm fine,_  he tried, and failed, to tell himself when he was sitting on the bed, but by then the words had fled into the howling white static of his mind.

 

 

 

Later -- much, much later -- he and Dex would talk things over and Dex would tell him that he seemed perfectly calm (if a bit blank-faced and robotic) through the whole checkup; that even when they redressed his side, he didn't flinch; that the monitors had registered that his hearts were pounding fast and hard, but that they'd figured it had to do more with his healing wounds than anything else.

What Maul _remembered_ , though, picked up once he was back outside; somewhere between the doors and Dex's speeder, he started shaking and couldn't make himself stop, and when Dex asked him what was wrong, all he could do was force out some strangled sound, shaking his head in disbelief, shaking too hard to walk.

What he remembered was Dex holding him by the upper arms to steady him, then wrapping arms around him when he frantically tried and failed to get himself back under control and ended up dissolving into helpless, desperate sobs for the first time since he was a small child.

That he did so sheltered in arms was a first, too.

 

 

 

Somehow, Maul ended up on the couch.

He woke up sore through; not the same kind of sore as being injured, though he could feel that, as well. But his head ached some, and his face was stuffy, and his chest felt hollow and wet, throbbing dully with every inhalation. He fell into a coughing fit, wincing as it ripped through his side and middle, and then remembered what had happened and scrubbed at his face as if he could get rid of the evidence of his tears long after they were dried to his face; if his Master saw--

But he wasn't on Mustafar. Or Orsis. Or the Works. He was on Dex's huge couch, covered up in a few blankets, and Dex himself was coming back to sit in the chair he had apparently dragged from the kitchen. "I woulda put ya to bed back in the greenhouse, but I didn't want you wakin' up alone, so I figured the couch would do for now. I got some tea for ya."

Maul vaguely remembered falling, then floating, after the force of his breakdown had finally waned somewhat; his mouth quivered a little as he pushed himself up to sit, scrambling to figure out how to apologize for-- whatever that was, whatever had gone so critically _wrong_  with him that he was reduced to crying like some child. But he couldn't seem to force words out beyond, "I'm sorry," and bent his head over the mug of tea Dex handed him, fighting the stinging in his eyes and the muddled, bewildered despair that he'd found himself drowning in.

"For what?" Dex sounded no less bewildered, though of a different kind. "There's nothin' to apologize for."

Maul didn't think that was true; he could come up with an entire laundry list in less than a half minute of things he'd done wrong today, from fighting with the Jedi to letting anxiety rule him to the weakness of falling apart like a child. He didn't know how to say any of that, though, and instead tried to just _breathe_  normally, even with the hollow ache in his chest.

"It's no crime bein' shakin' up," Dex said, after it was quiet for a minute or two. "And I don't want any apologies for that, anyway."

The tea was helping a little, at least in terms of making Maul's face feel less tight. His eyes were still stinging, though. After another short period of silence, he finally admitted, tiredly, "I don't know what to do."

"Well, what d'you _want_  to do?" Dex asked back; Maul couldn't make himself look up at the besalisk, but he could feel Dex watching him. Could feel the patience, too. The kindness.

The idea of doing anything simply because he wanted to was beyond Maul's ability to fathom, unless it was related to survival, at least these days. He had thought he wanted to kill Jedi for the longest time, but he knew now that he wouldn't even stand a chance in this state. And he couldn't seem to see with any clarity the _point_ , either. Revenge, his Master had said, but for what? Decimating the Sith? The Jedi were arrogant and controlling, but then again, so were most politicians. So were many citizens. Naboo alone had been a hotbed of sly corruption, never mind the rest of the galaxy. He knew his Master was trying to gain control over all of it, but it was by _feeding_ that corruption and encouraging it, not by stopping it.

The longer Maul was away from Master Sidious, the less any of it made sense.

"I want to leave," he said, after a moment, barely able to force his voice above a whisper. "I want to get away from all of it." A beat. "Everything."

It only occurred to him after he said it that it might seem he was ungrateful for Dex's help and hosting, but before he had a chance to explain, Dex said, "That's not too bad a goal, gettin' away. Would it make ya happy, though?"

"What does that matter?" Maul asked back, finally looking up, frowning.

For some reason, that seemed to make Dex sad; at least, that was how he felt in the Force. "I think it matters more'n you've ever been allowed to know."

It was another thing to work over in his head, when Maul went back to the greenhouse; what happiness had to do with anything. Or, for that matter, when the last time he had ever felt it was.

Or if he ever had.

When he realized, sometime in the deep night, that he couldn't remember anything more than rare, fleeting moments of it that dissolved quickly into blood, or misery, or loss, he ended up in tears all over again, pillow wrapped around his head, some strange and tangled mess of longing and self-loathing and confusion and grief.


End file.
